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Late quaternary hydrological changes at Tangra Yumco, Tibetan Plateau: a compound-specific isotope-based quantification of lake level changes

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Abstract

Lake level fluctuations are important features in paleo-reconstructions that can be linked to past climate changes. Closed-basin lakes on the south-central Tibetan Plateau record the balance between monsoonal precipitation and evaporative loss. To date, most studies provide only qualitative estimates of past hydrological changes. For the first time, we applied hydrogen isotopes (δD) of aquatic and terrestrial n-alkanes to quantify lake volume changes of Tangra Yumco and compared values to newly calculated lake volumes of Nam Co. We also used carbon isotopes of sedimentary n-alkanes to reveal past climate and environmental conditions around the lake. The water volume of Tangra Yumco changed by 146 km3 in the past 17.42 cal ka. Lake volume increased in two steps, the first mainly initiated by glacial meltwater input after 16 cal ka BP, and to a minor extent by first strengthening of the Asian Summer Monsoon (ASM). The second increase was caused by intensified summer monsoon precipitation at 11.45 cal ka BP. After 8.0 cal ka BP, lake volume decreased because of arid conditions, until an increase at 0.8 cal ka BP that was probably linked to a wet spell during the Little Ice Age. The lake level changes of Tangra Yumco and Nam Co were affected simultaneously by the ASM, although their amplitudes differed because of different local conditions, such as basin morphology or the blocking effect of neighboring mountains, which influences the rainout of air masses and wind-induced evaporation.

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Acknowledgments

This project was carried out in cooperation with the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research. We thank the German Research Foundation (DFG), which supported this research with grant Gl262/16-2 within priority program 1372 “Tibetan Plateau: Formation – Climate – Ecosystems (TiP).” We thank the Max Planck Society (MPG) and Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) for additional project funding. All scientists, technicians and other members of the TiP program are acknowledged for their support and assistance. Data sets reported here are available online at the PANGAEA database (www.pangaea.de).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena, Germany

    Franziska Günther, Andrej Thiele & Gerd Gleixner

  2. Friedrich Schiller University, Jena, Germany

    Sophie Biskop, Roland Mäusbacher & Torsten Haberzettl

  3. TEL, Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Tandong Yao

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  1. Franziska Günther
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  2. Andrej Thiele
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  3. Sophie Biskop
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  4. Roland Mäusbacher
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  5. Torsten Haberzettl
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  6. Tandong Yao
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  7. Gerd Gleixner
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Correspondence to Franziska Günther.

Electronic supplementary material

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ESM Table 1 Concentration of sedimentary n-alkanes (XLSX 69 kb)

10933_2016_9887_MOESM2_ESM.xlsx

ESM Table 2 Hydrogen isotopes (δD) of sedimentary n-alkanes, evaporation-to-inflow (E/I) and calculated lake volumes (XLSX 84 kb)

ESM Table 3 Carbon isotopes (δ13C) of sedimentary n-alkanes (XLSX 39 kb)

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Günther, F., Thiele, A., Biskop, S. et al. Late quaternary hydrological changes at Tangra Yumco, Tibetan Plateau: a compound-specific isotope-based quantification of lake level changes. J Paleolimnol 55, 369–382 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10933-016-9887-1

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