The Earth underwent a major transition from the warm climates of the Pliocene to the Pleistocene ice ages between 3.2 and 2.6 million years ago. The intensification of Northern Hemisphere Glaciation is the most obvious result of the Plio-Pleistocene transition. However, recent data show that the ocean also underwent a significant change, with the convergence of deep water mass properties in the...

Abstract. The mid-Pliocene warm period (3.264–3.025 Ma) is the most recent geological in which atmospheric CO2 concentration was approximately equal to we measure today (ca. 400 ppm). Sea surface temperature (SST) proxies indicate above-average warming over North Atlantic with respect pre-industrial period, may be linked an intensified Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). Earlier results ...

Dinomyidae is a family of rodents including one extant species, Dinomys branickii, but with high past diversity. Gyriabrus large dinomyid euhypsodont cheek teeth and an occlusal pattern that changes throughout the ontogeny animal. Eight species have been described in late Miocene to Pliocene Argentina, Uruguay, Colombia Brazil. The taxonomic status has questioned, being considered as juvenile f...

Yongle atoll in the Xisha (Paracel) Archipelago is an isolated carbonate platform developed on Precambrian metamorphic and Mesozoic volcanic rocks since early Miocene. To identify 3D stratigraphic architecture evolution of this platform, 13 high-resolution seismic profiles shallow-to-deep water multi-beam data were processed analyzed to reveal facies, sequence boundary reflectors, units, archit...

Cosmogenic aluminum-26 and beryllium-10 burial dates of low-lying fossiliferous breccia in the caves at Sterkfontein, South Africa, show that associated hominid fossils accumulated in the Lower Pliocene. These dates indicate that the skeleton StW 573 and newly discovered specimens from Jacovec Cavern have much the same age: approximately 4 million years. These specimens are thus of an age simil...

Tectonically induced changes in oceanic seaways had profound effects on global and regional climate during the Late Neogene. The constriction of the Central American Seaway reached a critical threshold during the early Pliocene ~4.8-4 million years (Ma) ago. Model simulations indicate the strengthening of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) with a signature warming response i...

Subfossil wood fragments up to 10 cm long and 2 cm in diameter recovered from a locality thought on the basis of diatom deposits to be upper Pliocene-lower Pleistocene (Oliver Bluffs, Sirius Formation, 85°1 O'S., between 1800 and 1900 m in the Transantarctic Mountains) were sectioned for identification. Degradation prevented observation of some wood features, but others were well preserved. All...

The thermal structure of the mid-Piacenzian ocean is obtained by combining the Pliocene Research, Interpretation and Synoptic Mapping Project (PRISM3) multiproxy sea-surface temperature (SST) reconstruction with bottom water temperature estimates from 27 locations produced using Mg/Ca paleothermometry based upon the ostracod genus Krithe. Deep water temperature estimates are skewed toward the A...

Introduction Conclusions References