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Elemental composition of the Laguna Potrok Aike sediment sequence reveals paleoclimatic changes over the past 51 ka in southern Patagonia, Argentina

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Abstract

During the lake deep drilling campaign PASADO in 2008, more than 500 m of lacustrine sediment was recovered from the maar lake Laguna Potrok Aike, Argentina. The major element composition was assessed at high resolution with an ITRAX X-ray fluorescence core scanner. The sharp boundary between a carbonate-bearing and a carbonate-free depositional system occurs at 13.5 cal. ka BP and marks the transition from glacial to Late Glacial sediments. Holocene and Late Glacial sediments can be distinguished by elements that are indicative of organic matter (Br, Cl) or calcite (Ca). Glacial sediments are characterized by elements that represent terrigenous clastic input (Fe, Ti, K, Si). Trace elements (Mn, Rb, V, Ni) accumulate with the bulk of lithogenic elements indicating frequent oxic conditions and rare diagenetic remobilization. Based on principal component analysis we interpret the scores of the first principle component as a summarizing indicator for climate-related variations of depositional conditions. During the Holocene climate changes mirror the total inorganic carbon profile, which was used as a proxy for lake-level reconstructions of the past 16 ka in previous studies. High scores in the first principle component probably reflect periods of increased chemical over mechanical weathering and developing soils and vegetation cover limiting sediment availability for erosional processes. These intervals often also show increases in total organic carbon values and total organic carbon/total nitrogen ratios, which are associated with periods of Antarctic warming in the last glacial. Geochemical variations of the clastic glacial sediments are explored by excluding carbonate-bearing sediments from principal component analysis. Although, in this lake, Ca is a purely clastic signal in carbonate-free sediments, it does not correlate with the bulk of indicators for terrigenous input. Instead Ca dominates a second principal component together with Sr. This component mainly distinguishes coarse grained layers from the remaining sediment. The main provenance of this coarse-grained material is suggested to be a basalt outcrop at the western shore. Low lake levels, high waves and flash-flood events may have increased the availability of basaltic sand during extremely cold, arid and windy conditions. High wind speeds and lack of vegetation may have facilitated the increased transport of coarse-grained material into the center of Laguna Potrok Aike. Decreases in the second principal component can be observed during Oxygen Isotope Stage 2 when increased dust input has been found in cores from Laguna Potrok Aike, the Southern Ocean and Antarctica.

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Acknowledgments

This research is supported by the International Continental Scientific Drilling Program (ICDP) in the framework of the “Potrok Aike Maar Lake Sediment Archive Drilling Project” (PASADO). Funding for drilling was provided by the ICDP, the German Science Foundation (DFG), the Swiss National Funds (SNF), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), the Swedish Vetenskapsrådet (VR) and the University of Bremen. We are much obliged to Sabine Stahl for laboratory assistance. For their invaluable help in field logistics and drilling we thank the staff of INTA Santa Cruz and Rio Dulce Catering as well as the Moreteau family and the DOSECC crew.

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Correspondence to Annette Hahn.

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PASADO Science Team cited at: http://www.icdp-online.org/front_content.php?idcat=1494

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10933_2014_9798_MOESM1_ESM.pdf

Supplementary material ESM1: Scatter plots of best fits between wavelength dispersive XRF (WD-XRF) measurements versus energy dispersive XRF (ED-XRF) scanning data. Coarse grained samples and tephra samples are marked in red and yellow respectively. Correlation coefficients are indicated. Scanning results are normalized by dividing the counts by the coherent scattering (cnts/coh) or the total counts (cnts/kcps). (PDF 1029 kb)

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Hahn, A., Kliem, P., Oehlerich, M. et al. Elemental composition of the Laguna Potrok Aike sediment sequence reveals paleoclimatic changes over the past 51 ka in southern Patagonia, Argentina. J Paleolimnol 52, 349–366 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10933-014-9798-y

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