Paleo-ENSO influence on African environments and early modern humans

In this study, we synthesize terrestrial and marine proxy records, spanning the past 620 ky, to decipher pan-African climate variability and its drivers and potential linkages to hominin evolution. We find a tight correlation between moisture availability across Africa to El Niño Southern Ocean osci...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS Vol. 118; no. 23; pp. 1 - 6
Main Authors:	Kaboth-Bahr, Stefanie, Gosling, William D., Vogelsang, Ralf, Bahr, André, Scerri, Eleanor M. L., Asrat, Asfawossen, Cohen, Andrew S., Düsing, Walter, Foerster, Verena, Lamb, Henry F., Maslin, Mark A., Roberts, Helen M., Schäbitz, Frank, Trauth, Martin H.
Format:	Journal Article
Language:	English
Published:	Washington National Academy of Sciences 08-06-2021
Subjects:	Biological Sciences Climate change Climate variability El Nino Evolution Hominids Latitude Moisture availability Pan-Africanism Physical Sciences Pleistocene Terrestrial environments Variability Africa
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Summary:	In this study, we synthesize terrestrial and marine proxy records, spanning the past 620 ky, to decipher pan-African climate variability and its drivers and potential linkages to hominin evolution. We find a tight correlation between moisture availability across Africa to El Niño Southern Ocean oscillation (ENSO) variability, a manifestation of the Walker Circulation, that was most likely driven by changes in Earth’s eccentricity. Our results demonstrate that low-latitude insolation was a prominent driver of pan-African climate change during the Middle to Late Pleistocene. We argue that these low-latitude climate processes governed the dispersion and evolution of vegetation as well as mammals in eastern and western Africa by increasing resource-rich and stable ecotonal settings thought to have been important to early modern humans.
Bibliography:	Author contributions: S.K.-B. designed research; S.K.-B. analyzed data; and S.K.-B., W.D.G., R.V., A.B., E.M.L.S., A.A., A.S.C., W.D., V.F., H.F.L., M.A.M., H.M.R., F.S., and M.H.T. wrote the paper. Edited by J. Tyler Faith, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, and accepted by Editorial Board Member James F. O’Connell April 14, 2021 (received for review September 3, 2020)
ISSN:	0027-8424 1091-6490
DOI:	10.1073/pnas.2018277118