Early Holocene greening of the Sahara requires Mediterranean winter rainfall
Abstract
Explaining the greening of the Sahara during the Holocene has been a challenge for decades. A strengthening of the African monsoon caused by increased summer insolation is usually cited to explain why the Sahara was vegetated from 14,000 to 5,000 y ago. Here, we provide a unique climate record of quantified winter, spring, and summer precipitation in Morocco over the past 18,500 y, and numeric simulations, which show that moisture contributions from the Mediterranean Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean in winter, were as important as the expanded summer monsoon for the greening of the Sahara during the African humid period. The findings of this study will help to better understand and simulate climate variability over northern Africa.
- Publication:
-
Proceedings of the National Academy of Science
- Pub Date:
- June 2021
- DOI:
- 10.1073/pnas.2024898118
- Bibcode:
- 2021PNAS..11824898C
- Keywords:
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- African humid period;
- green Sahara;
- Holocene;
- paleoclimate reconstructions;
- vegetation model simulations