Extreme glacial cooling likely led to hominin depopulation of Europe in the Early Pleistocene.

The oldest known hominin remains in Europe [~1.5 to ~1.1 million years ago (Ma)] have been recovered from Iberia, where paleoenvironmental reconstructions have indicated warm and wet interglacials and mild glacials, supporting the view that once established, hominin populations persisted continuously. We report analyses of marine and terrestrial proxies from a deep-sea core on the Portugese margin that show the presence of pronounced millennial-scale climate variability during a glacial period ~1.154 to ~1.123 Ma, culminating in a terminal stadial cooling comparable to the most extreme events of the last 400,000 years. Climate envelope-model simulations reveal a drastic decrease in early hominin habitat suitability around the Mediterranean during the terminal stadial. We suggest that these extreme conditions led to the depopulation of Europe, perhaps lasting for several successive glacial-interglacial cycles.

Timing and dynamics of Late Wolstonian Substage 'Moreton Stadial' (MIS 6) glaciation in the English West Midlands, UK.

Glaciation during the late Middle Pleistocene is widely recognized across continental northwest Europe, but its extent and palaeoenvironmental significance in the British Isles are disputed. Although glaciogenic sediments at Wolston, Warwickshire, in the English West Midlands, have been used to define the stratotype of the Wolstonian Stage, their age has been variably assigned between marine isotope stages (MIS) 12 and 6. Here we present sedimentological and stratigraphical observations from five sites across the English West Midlands whose chronology is constrained by new luminescence ages from glaciofluvial sediments, supplemented by cosmogenic 36Cl exposure dating of erratic boulders. The ages suggest that between 199 ± 5 and 147 ± 2.5 ka the British Ice Sheet advanced into the English West Midlands as far south as Moreton-in-Marsh, Gloucestershire. This advance is assigned to the Moreton Stadial of the Late Wolstonian Substage. Dating of the glaciation to this substage allows correlation of the Moreton Stadial glacial deposits in the English West Midlands with those of the Drenthe Stadial during the Late Saalian Substage across continental northwest Europe.

The configuration of Northern Hemisphere ice sheets through the Quaternary.

Our understanding of how global climatic changes are translated into ice-sheet fluctuations and sea-level change is currently limited by a lack of knowledge of the configuration of ice sheets prior to the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). Here, we compile a synthesis of empirical data and numerical modelling results related to pre-LGM ice sheets to produce new hypotheses regarding their extent in the Northern Hemisphere (NH) at 17 time-slices that span the Quaternary. Our reconstructions illustrate pronounced ice-sheet asymmetry within the last glacial cycle and significant variations in ice-marginal positions between older glacial cycles. We find support for a significant reduction in the extent of the Laurentide Ice Sheet (LIS) during MIS 3, implying that global sea levels may have been 30-40 m higher than most previous estimates. Our ice-sheet reconstructions illustrate the current state-of-the-art knowledge of pre-LGM ice sheets and provide a conceptual framework to interpret NH landscape evolution.

Stratigraphy of the Anthropocene.

The Anthropocene, an informal term used to signal the impact of collective human activity on biological, physical and chemical processes on the Earth system, is assessed using stratigraphic criteria. It is complex in time, space and process, and may be considered in terms of the scale, relative timing, duration and novelty of its various phenomena. The lithostratigraphic signal includes both direct components, such as urban constructions and man-made deposits, and indirect ones, such as sediment flux changes. Already widespread, these are producing a significant 'event layer', locally with considerable long-term preservation potential. Chemostratigraphic signals include new organic compounds, but are likely to be dominated by the effects of CO(2) release, particularly via acidification in the marine realm, and man-made radionuclides. The sequence stratigraphic signal is negligible to date, but may become geologically significant over centennial/millennial time scales. The rapidly growing biostratigraphic signal includes geologically novel aspects (the scale of globally transferred species) and geologically will have permanent effects.