Abstract
Coastal lakes in Antarctica provide exceptional archives of past climatic and environmental change. Their evolution is closely linked to variations in relative sea level (RSL) driven by deglaciation, making them ideal natural laboratories for investigating marine-lacustrine transitions and reconstructing ancient sea levels. This study presents a high-resolution reconstruction of mid- to late-Holocene paleoenvironmental changes from Heart Lake, a low-elevation coastal lake in the Larsemann Hills, East Antarctica. Multiple proxies, including diatom assemblages, environmental magnetic parameters, geochemical indicators, and sedimentological features, were employed to decipher the regional paleoclimate and environmental history. The lake existed as a submarine basin from approximately 6.37 to 3.07 cal ka BP. Around 4.3 cal ka BP, increasing chemical weathering indices suggest a trend toward warmer conditions in the lake. The first appearance of lacustrine diatoms around 3.07 cal ka BP marks the onset of environmental transition within the basin. By ~ 1.75 cal ka BP, the lake had become an isolated freshwater system. This shift from a marine to a lacustrine environment was likely driven by a post-glacial isostatic rebound and the consequent uplift of the land surface.
Data availability
The authors declare that the data supporting the findings of this study are available within the paper, its supplementary information files and extended data files.
References
Mackintosh, A. N. et al. Retreat history of the East Antarctic ice sheet since the last glacial maximum. Quat Sci. Rev. 100, 10–30 (2014).
Fretwell, P. et al. Bedmap2: improved ice bed, surface and thickness datasets for Antarctica. Cryosph 7, 375–393 (2013).
Robinson, D. E., Menzies, J., Wellner, J. S. & Clark, R. W. Subglacial sediment deformation in the Ross Sea, Antarctica. Quat Sci. Adv. 4, 100029 (2021).
Whitehouse, P. L., Gomez, N., King, M. A. & Wiens, D. A. Solid Earth change and the evolution of the Antarctic ice sheet. Nat. Commun. 10, 503 (2019).
Verleyen, E., Hodgson, D. A., Sabbe, K. & Vyverman, W. Late quaternary deglaciation and climate history of the Larsemann Hills(East Antarctica). J. Quat Sci. 19, 361–375 (2004).
Mahesh, B. S., Warrier, A. K., Avadhani, A., Mohan, R. & Tiwari, M. Palaeolimnological records of regime shifts from Marine-To-Lacustrine system in a coastal Antarctic lake in response to Post-Glacial isostatic uplift. Curr. Sci. 115, 1679 (2018).
Matsuoka, K. et al. Quantarctica, an integrated mapping environment for Antarctica, the Southern Ocean, and sub-Antarctic Islands. Environ. Model. Softw. 140, 105015 (2021).
Cox, S. C. et al. A continent-wide detailed geological map dataset of Antarctica. Sci. Data. 10, 250 (2023).
Gao, Y. et al. Ice sheet changes and GIA-induced surface displacement of the Larsemann hills during the last 50 Kyr. J. Geophys. Res. Solid Earth 125, e2020JB020167 (2020).
Mahesh, B. S., Nair, A., Ghadi, P., Warrier, A. K. & Mohan, R. Holocene sedimentology in an isolation basin in the Larsemann Hills, East Antarctica. Polar Sci. 30, 100729 (2021).
Hodgson, D. A. et al. Rapid early holocene sea-level rise in Prydz Bay, East Antarctica. Glob Planet. Change. 139, 128–140 (2016).
Noronha-D’Mello, C. A. et al. Glacial-Holocene climate-driven shifts in lacustrine and terrestrial environments: rock magnetic and geochemical evidence from East Antarctic Mochou lake. Palaeogeogr Palaeoclimatol Palaeoecol. 576, 110505 (2021).
Warrier, A. K. et al. Glacial–interglacial Climatic variations at the schirmacher Oasis, East antarctica: the first report from environmental magnetism. Palaeogeogr Palaeoclimatol Palaeoecol. 412, 249–260 (2014).
Čejka, T. et al. Timing of the neoglacial onset on the North-Eastern Antarctic Peninsula based on lacustrine archive from lake Anónima, Vega Island. Glob Planet. Change. 184, 103050 (2020).
Warrier, A. K., Mahesh, B. S., Mohan, R. & Shankar, R. A 43-ka mineral magnetic record of environmental variations from lacustrine sediments of schirmacher Oasis, East Antarctica. Catena 202, 105300 (2021).
Bertler, N. A. N., Mayewski, P. A. & Carter, L. Cold conditions in Antarctica during the little ice Age — Implications for abrupt climate change mechanisms. Earth Planet. Sci. Lett. 308, 41–51 (2011).
Lüning, S., Gałka, M. & Vahrenholt, F. The medieval climate anomaly in Antarctica. Palaeogeogr Palaeoclimatol Palaeoecol. 532, 109251 (2019).
Joju, G. S. et al. A high-resolution record of Mid- to Late-Holocene environmental changes from a land-locked lake in schirmacher Oasis, East Antarctica. Holocene 34, 881–894 (2024).
Noronha-D’Mello, C. A., Nair, A., Mahesh, B. S., Warrier, A. K. & Mohan, R. Mid to Late-Holocene environmental dynamics recorded in lake pup Lagoon, East antarctica: insights from environmental magnetism and biogeochemical proxies. Holocene 34, 1572–1586 (2024).
Sproson, A. D. et al. Beryllium isotopes in sediments from lake Maruwan Oike and lake Skallen, East Antarctica, reveal substantial glacial discharge during the late holocene. Quat Sci. Rev. 256, 106841 (2021).
Suganuma, Y. et al. Regional sea-level highstand triggered holocene ice sheet thinning across coastal Dronning Maud Land, East Antarctica. Commun. Earth Environ. 3, 273 (2022).
Verleyen, E. et al. Ice sheet retreat and glacio-isostatic adjustment in Lützow-Holm Bay, East Antarctica. Quat Sci. Rev. 169, 85–98 (2017).
Gasparon, M., Lanyon, R., Burgess, J. S. & Sigurdsson, I. A. The Freshwater Lakes of the Larsemann Hills, East Antarctica: Chemical Characteristics of the Water Column. (2002).
Gillieson, D. An Atlas of the Lakes of the Larsemann Hills, Princess Elizabeth Land, Antarctica Vol. 74 (Australian National Antarctic Research Expeditions, 1990).
Hodgson, D. A. et al. Were the Larsemann hills ice-free through the last glacial maximum? Antarct. Sci. 13, 440–454 (2001).
Asthana, R. et al. Sedimentary processes in two different Polar periglacial environments: examples from schirmacher Oasis and Larsemann Hills, East Antarctica. Geol. Soc. Spec. Publ. 381, 411–427 (2013).
Carson, C. J. & Grew, E. S. Geology of the Larsemann Hills Region Antarctica (1: 25000 Scale Map) (Geoscience Australia, 2007).
Blaauw, M. & Christen, J. A. Flexible paleoclimate age-depth models using an autoregressive gamma process. Bayesian Anal. 6, 457–474 (2011).
R Core Team. R: A Language and Environment for Statistical Computing. at (2021). https://www.r-project.org
Hogg, A. G. et al. SHCal20 Southern hemisphere Calibration, 0–55,000 years Cal BP. Radiocarbon 62, 759–778 (2020).
Heaton, T. J. et al. Marine20 - The marine radiocarbon age calibration curve (0–55,000 cal BP). Radiocarbon 62, 779–820 (2020).
Rathburn, A. E., Pichon, J. J., Ayress, M. A. & De Deckker, P. Microfossil and stable-isotope evidence for changes in late holocene palaeoproductivity and palaeoceanographic conditions in the Prydz Bay region of Antarctica. Palaeogeogr Palaeoclimatol Palaeoecol. 131, 485–510 (1997).
Verleyen, E., Hodgson, D. A., Sabbe, K., Vanhoutte, K. & Vyverman, W. Coastal oceanographic conditions in the Prydz Bay region (East Antarctica) during the holocene recorded in an isolation basin. Holocene 14, 246–257 (2004).
Ingólfsson, Ó. et al. Antarctic glacial history since the last glacial maximum: an overview of the record on land. Antarct. Sci. 10, 326–344 (1998).
Berkman, P. A. et al. Circum-Antarctic coastal environmental shifts during the late quaternary reflected by emerged marine deposits. Antarct. Sci. 10, 345–362 (1998).
Thompson, R. & Oldfield, F. Environmental Magnetism (Springer Netherlands, 1986). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-8036-8
Walden, J., Oldfield, F. & Smith, J. Environmental Magnetism: A Practical Guide (Quaternary Research Association, 1999).
Liu, Q. et al. Environmental magnetism: principles and applications. Rev. Geophys. 50, RG4002 (2012).
Liu, Q., Roberts, A. P., Torrent, J., Horng, C. S. & Larrasoaña, J. C. What do the HIRM and S-ratio really measure in environmental magnetism? Geochem. Geophys. Geosyst. 8, 1–10 (2007).
USEPA. United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) (1996) Method 3050B: Acid Digestion of Sludges, Sediments, and Soils, Revision, 2. (1996). https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2015-06/documents/epa-3050b.pdf
Nesbitt, H. W. & Young, G. M. Early proterozoic climates and plate motions inferred from major element chemistry of lutites. Nature 299, 715–717 (1982).
Fedo, C. M., Nesbitt, W., Young, G. M. & H. & Unraveling the effects of potassium metasomatism in sedimentary rocks and paleosols, with implications for paleoweathering conditions and provenance. Geology 23, 921 (1995).
Cox, R., Lowe, D. R. & Cullers, R. L. The influence of sediment recycling and basement composition on evolution of mudrock chemistry in the Southwestern united States. Geochim. Cosmochim. Acta. 59, 2919–2940 (1995).
Heiri, O., Lotter, A. F. & Lemcke, G. Loss on ignition as a method for estimating organic and carbonate content in sediments: reproducibility and comparability of results. J. Paleolimnol. 25, 101–110 (2001).
Santisteban, J. I. et al. Loss on ignition: A qualitative or quantitative method for organic matter and carbonate mineral content in sediments? J. Paleolimnol. 32, 287–299 (2004).
Dean, W. E. The carbon cycle and biogeochemical dynamics in lake sediments. J. Paleolimnol. 21, 375–393 (1999).
Paterson, G. A. & Heslop, D. New methods for unmixing sediment grain size data. Geochem. Geophys. Geosyst. 16, 4494–4506 (2015).
Blott, S. J., Pye, K. & Gradistat A grain size distribution and statistics package for the analysis of unconsolidated sediments. Earth Surf. Process. Land. 26, 1237–1248 (2001).
Petersen, N., Von Dobeneck, T. & Vali, H. Fossil bacterial magnetite in deep-sea sediments from the South Atlantic ocean. Nature 320, 611–615 (1986).
Hammer, Ø., Harper, D. A. T. & Ryan, P. D. PAST: paleontological statistics software package for education and data analysis. Palaeontol. Electron. 4, 9 (2001).
Frontier, S. Étude de La décroissance des valeurs propres Dans Une analyse En composantes principales: comparaison avec Le modd́le du bâton brisé. J. Exp. Mar. Bio Ecol. 25, 67–75 (1976).
Jackson, D. A. Stopping rules in principal components analysis: A comparison of heuristical and statistical approaches. Ecology 74, 2204–2214 (1993).
Worm, H. U. On the superparamagnetic - Stable single domain transition for magnetite, and frequency dependence of susceptibility. Geophys. J. Int. 133, 201–206 (1998).
Dearing, J. A., Bird, P. M., Dann, R. J. L. & Benjamin, S. F. Secondary ferrimagnetic minerals in Welsh soils: A comparison of mineral magnetic detection methods and implications for mineral formation. Geophys. J. Int. 130, 727–736 (1997).
Maher, B. A. Magnetic properties of some synthetic sub-micron magnetites. Geophys. J. 94, 83–96 (1988).
Oldfield, F. Environmental magnetism - A personal perspective. Quat Sci. Rev. 10, 73–85 (1991).
Evans, M. & Heller, F. Environmental Magnetism: Principles and Applications of Enviromagnetics, Int. Geophys. Ser Vol. 86 (Academic, 2003).
Chaparro, M. A. E., Moralejo, M. P., Böhnel, H. N. & Acebal, S. G. Iron oxide mineralogy in Mollisols, aridisols and entisols from Southwestern Pampean region (Argentina) by environmental magnetism approach. Catena 190, 104534 (2020).
King, J., Banerjee, S. K., Marvin, J. & Özdemir, Ö. A comparison of different magnetic methods for determining the relative grain size of magnetite in natural materials: some results from lake sediments. Earth Planet. Sci. Lett. 59, 404–419 (1982).
Joju, G. S. et al. Mineral magnetic properties of surface soils from the Broknes and Grovnes Peninsula, Larsemann Hills, East Antarctica. Polar Sci. 38, 100968 (2023).
Paasche, Ø., Løvlie, R., Dahl, S. O., Bakke, J. & Nesje, A. Bacterial magnetite in lake sediments: late glacial to holocene climate and sedimentary changes in Northern Norway. Earth Planet. Sci. Lett. 223, 319–333 (2004).
Snowball, I. F. Magnetic hysteresis properties of greigite (Fe3S4) and a new occurrence in holocene sediments from Swedish Lappland. Phys. Earth Planet. Inter. 68, 32–40 (1991).
Oldfield, F. Toward the discrimination of fine-grained ferrimagnets by magnetic measurements in lake and near-shore marine sediments. J. Geophys. Res. 99, 9045–9050 (1994).
Liu, W. J. et al. Elemental and strontium isotopic geochemistry of the soil profiles developed on limestone and sandstone in karstic terrain on Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau, china: implications for chemical weathering and parent materials. J. Asian Earth Sci. 67–68, 138–152 (2013).
Tsai, P. H., You, C. F., Huang, K. F., Chung, C. H. & Sun, Y. Bin. Lithium distribution and isotopic fractionation during chemical weathering and soil formation in a loess profile. J. Asian Earth Sci. 87, 1–10 (2014).
Wei, G. Y. et al. A chemical weathering control on the delivery of particulate iron to the continental shelf. Geochim. Cosmochim. Acta. 308, 204–216 (2021).
Davies, S. J., Lamb, H. F. & Roberts, S. J. Micro-XRF core scanning in palaeolimnology: recent developments. Micro-XRF Stud. Sediment. Cores. 189–226. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9849-5_7 (2015).
Burnett, A. P., Soreghan, M. J., Scholz, C. A. & Brown, E. T. Tropical East African climate change and its relation to global climate: A record from lake Tanganyika, tropical East Africa, over the past 90 + kyr. Palaeogeogr Palaeoclimatol Palaeoecol. 303, 155–167 (2011).
Chen, H. F. et al. The Ti/Al molar ratio as a new proxy for tracing sediment transportation processes and its application in aeolian events and sea level change in East Asia. J. Asian Earth Sci. 73, 31–38 (2013).
Reichart, G. J., Dulk, D., Visser, M., Van Der Weijden, H. J., Zachariasse, W. J. & C. H. & A 225 Kyr record of dust supply, paleoproductivity and the oxygen minimum zone from the Murray ridge (Northern Arabian Sea). Palaeogeogr Palaeoclimatol Palaeoecol. 134, 149–169 (1997).
An, F. Y., Ma, H. Z., Wei, H. C. & Lai, Z. P. Distinguishing aeolian signature from lacustrine sediments of the Qaidam basin in Northeastern Qinghai-Tibetan plateau and its palaeoclimatic implications. Aeolian Res. 4, 17–30 (2012).
Warrier, A. K., Pednekar, H., Mahesh, B. S., Mohan, R. & Gazi, S. Sediment grain size and surface textural observations of quartz grains in late quaternary lacustrine sediments from schirmacher Oasis, East antarctica: paleoenvironmental significance. Polar Sci. 10, 89–100 (2016).
Gkinis, V. et al. Oxygen-18 isotope ratios from the EPICA Dome C ice core at 11 cm resolution. at (2021). https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.939445
Lambert, F., Bigler, M., Steffensen, J. P., Hutterli, M. & Fischer, H. Centennial mineral dust variability in high-resolution ice core data from dome C, Antarctica. Clim. Past. 8, 609–623 (2012).
Solanki, S. K., Usoskin, I. G., Kromer, B., Schüssler, M. & Beer, J. Unusual activity of the sun during recent decades compared to the previous 11,000 years. Nature 431, 1084–1087 (2004).
Berger, A. & Loutre, M. F. Insolation values for the climate of the last 10 million years. Quat Sci. Rev. 10, 297–317 (1991).
Etourneau, J. et al. Holocene climate variations in the Western Antarctic peninsula: evidence for sea ice extent predominantly controlled by changes in insolation and ENSO variability. Clim. Past. 9, 1431–1446 (2013).
Passega, R. Texture as characteristic of clastic deposition. Am. Assoc. Pet. Geol. Bull. 41, 1952–1984 (1957).
Johnson, K. M. et al. Sensitivity of holocene East Antarctic productivity to subdecadal variability set by sea ice. Nat. Geosci. 14, 762–768 (2021).
Sverdrup, H. U. The currents off the Coast of queen Maud land. Nor. Geogr. Tidsskr - Nor. J. Geogr. 14, 239–249 (1953).
Whitworth, T., Orsi, A. H., Kim, S. J., Nowlin, W. D. & Locarnini, R. A. Water Masses and Mixing Near the Antarctic Slope Front. in Ocean, Ice, and Atmosphere: Interactions at the Antarctic Continental Margin (eds. Jacobs, S. S. & Weiss, R. F.) 1–27American Geophysical Union, (1998). https://doi.org/10.1029/ar075p0001
Kim, C. S. et al. Variability of the Antarctic coastal current in the Amundsen sea. Estuar. Coast Shelf Sci. 181, 123–133 (2016).
Jouzel, J. et al. Orbital and millennial Antarctic climate variability over the past 800,000 years. Sci. (80-). 317, 793–796 (2007).
Denis, D. et al. Holocene glacier and deep water dynamics, Adélie land region, East Antarctica. Quat Sci. Rev. 28, 1291–1303 (2009).
Davison, W. Iron and manganese in lakes. Earth Sci. Rev. 34, 119–163 (1993).
Wang, H., Liu, H., Liu, Y., Cui, H. & Abrahamsen, N. Mineral magnetism and other characteristics of sediments from an alpine lake (3,410 m a.s.l.) in central China and implications for late holocene climate and environment. J. Paleolimnol. 43, 345–367 (2010).
Dearing, J. A. Holocene environmental change from magnetic proxies in lake sediments. In Quaternary climates, Environments and Magnetism (eds Maher, B. A. & Thompson, R.) 231–278 (Cambridge University Press Cambridge, 1999).
Larrasoaña, J. C. et al. Magnetotactic bacterial response to Antarctic dust supply during the Palaeocene-Eocene thermal maximum. Earth Planet. Sci. Lett. 333–334, 122–133 (2012).
Paleari, C. I. et al. Aeolian dust provenance in central East Antarctica during the holocene: environmental constraints from Single-Grain Raman spectroscopy. Geophys. Res. Lett. 46, 9968–9979 (2019).
Verleyen, E., Hodgson, D. A., Milne, G. A., Sabbe, K. & Vyverman, W. Relative sea-level history from the Lambert glacier region, East Antarctica, and its relation to deglaciation and holocene glacier readvance. Quat Res. 63, 45–52 (2005).
Verleyen, E. et al. Post-glacial regional climate variability along the East Antarctic coastal margin-Evidence from shallow marine and coastal terrestrial records. Earth Sci. Rev. 104, 199–212 (2011).
Shi, G., Teng, J., Ma, H., Wang, D. & Li, Y. Metals in topsoil in Larsemann Hills, an ice-free area in East antarctica: lithological and anthropogenic inputs. Catena 160, 41–49 (2018).
Mahesh, B. S., Warrier, A. K., Nair, A., Fernandes, R. & Mohan, R. Evolutionary inferences from the sedimentary deposits of lake LH73, Larsemann Hills, East Antarctica. Catena 203, 105341 (2021).
Rhodes, R. H. et al. Little ice age climate and oceanic conditions of the Ross Sea, Antarctica from a coastal ice core record. Clim. Past. 8, 1223–1238 (2012).
Koffman, B. G. et al. Abrupt changes in atmospheric circulation during the medieval climate anomaly and little ice age recorded by Sr-Nd isotopes in the Siple dome ice Core, Antarctica. Paleoceanogr. Paleoclimatol. 38, e2022PA004543 (2023).
Acknowledgements
A.K.W. gratefully acknowledges the Director of CSIR-NIO, Goa, and Dr. Firoz Badesab (CSIR-NIO) for providing access to magnetic instrumentation facilities. M.B.S., C.D., and R.M. thank the Director of NCPOR for continuous support and encouragement. J.G.S. expresses gratitude to Dr. Lino Yovan, Dr. Raksha Shetty, and Ms. Ashwathy C., research scholars at Manipal Institute of Technology, for their assistance with location map preparation and ICP-OES analysis. We are thankful to the Antarctic Logistics Division, NCPOR, and to the leader, station commander, and members of the 33rd Indian Scientific Expedition to Antarctica for their invaluable assistance during fieldwork. Financial support for this research was provided by the ESSO-National Centre for Polar and Ocean Research, Ministry of Earth Sciences, Government of India, through a project awarded to AKW and KB (Sanction: NCPOR/2019/PACER-POP/ES-02 dated 05/07/2019) under the PACER Outreach Programme (POP) initiative. We also thank the editor and reviewers for their constructive comments, which greatly improved the clarity and overall quality of the manuscript. This is NCPOR contribution no. J-87/2025-26.
Funding
Open access funding provided by Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal. Financial support for this research was provided by the ESSO-National Centre for Polar and Ocean Research, Ministry of Earth Sciences, Government of India, through a project awarded to AKW and KB (Sanction: NCPOR/2019/PACER-POP/ES-02 dated 05/07/2019) under the PACER Outreach Programme (POP) initiative.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
J.G.S., A.K.W. and M.B. conceived the idea for the study. Fieldwork was carried out by A.K.W., M.B., and C.D. Analytical work was performed by J.G.S., A.S.Y., K.A.A., A.J., M.K., S.K. and M.C.M. G.V. assisted with figure preparation and data curation. The manuscript was written by J.G.S. with inputs from A.K.W, M.B., C.D., M.K., M.C.M., R.M. and K.B.
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The authors declare no competing interests.
Additional information
Publisher’s note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Supplementary Information
Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.
Rights and permissions
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
About this article
Cite this article
Joju, G.S., Warrier, A.K., Mahesh, B.S. et al. Environmental evolution of a coastal lake in the Larsemann Hills, East Antarctica during the Holocene: a multi-proxy perspective. Sci Rep (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-39218-8
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-39218-8
