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Spatially variable response of Antarctica’s ice sheets to orbital forcing during the Pliocene

Nature Geoscience volume 19, pages 182–188 (2026)Cite this article

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Abstract

Variations in Earth’s orbit pace global ice-volume and sea-level changes, but the variability in the response for different sectors of the Antarctic Ice Sheet to orbitally forced climate change remains unclear. Here we present geological records of iceberg-rafted debris and other proxies from locations adjacent to the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) with comparisons to an existing East Antarctic Ice Sheet (EAIS) record over the time interval ~3.3–2.3 million years ago. Iceberg calving events from the WAIS recorded in Ross Sea sediment cores show a linear response to orbital forcing at timescales corresponding to obliquity (~40,000 years) and precession (~23,000–19,000 years) modulated by eccentricity (~100,000 years). This contrasts with an existing record adjacent to the EAIS, which does not contain obliquity pacing. Combined with ice-sheet model sensitivity tests, the geological data show that the WAIS is highly dynamic and responsive to oceanic melt driven by changes in Southern Ocean circulation, together with atmospheric forcing through variations in local insolation. Conversely, the EAIS appears less responsive to oceanic forcing, despite being the dominant source of meltwater to the global ocean during the mid-Pliocene. Our results imply a substantial role for atmospheric warming on mid-Pliocene sea-level from both WAIS and EAIS.

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Fig. 1: Location of IODP Sites U1524 and U1361 and source margin of icebergs tracked from 1978 and 1992–2021.
Fig. 2: Depth series developed for IODP Site U1524 between 3.3 Ma and 2.3 Ma.
Fig. 3: Power spectral estimates and multitaper method time-frequency analysis of WAIS and EAIS IBRD MAR records.

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Data availability

The data presented in this Article are available via Figshare at https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.30015322 (ref. 72).

Code availability

Scripts used for data analysis presented in this Article are available via Figshare at https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.30015322 (ref. 72).

Change history

  • 28 January 2026

    In the version of the article initially published, the text “FS was supported by NWO (Dutch Research Council) grant OCENW.M.21.200” was missing from the Acknowledgements section and has now been added to the HTML and PDF versions of the article.

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Acknowledgements

This research used data and samples provided by the International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP), which is sponsored by the US National Science Foundation (NSF) and participating countries under the management of Joint Oceanographic Institutions. Development of the IBRD MAR record was funded by grant numbers NSF-OCE 1450528 and NSF-OPP 2000997. Organic geochemical palaeoceanographic proxies (TEX86L and δD of n-C18 fatty acid), performed by O.S. and M.Y., was funded by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) KAKENHI Grant Numbers 17H01166, 17H06318 and 20H00626. Biogenic opal MAR was determined by O.E.R. and funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) (grant no. R03039/4). N.R.G. was funded by the Royal Society of New Zealand contract VUW-1501 and by Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment contracts RTUV1705 (NZSeaRise). R.M. was funded by Royal Society of New Zealand Marsden Fund contract MFP-VUW2207. R.M. and N.R.G. were supported by ANTA1801 (Antarctic Science Platform). The Parallel Ice Sheet Model (PISM) is supported by NASA grant numbers NNX13AM16G and NNX13AK27G. T.v.P. was supported as Research Fellow by the University of Leicester and NERC NE/R018235/1. J.S.L. was supported by ECORD and the Research Council of Norway. FS was supported by NWO (Dutch Research Council) grant OCENW.M.21.200. We also thank the numerous scientists who collected site survey data and developed the proposals and hypotheses that led to IODP Expedition 374. Expedition 374 was conducted under the Antarctic Conservative Act permit number ACA 2018-027 (permit holder: B. Clement, JRSO, IODP, TAMU, College Station, Texas, USA 77845).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Earth Sciences, Binghamton University, Binghamton, NY, USA

    Molly O. Patterson, Christiana Rosenberg, William D. Arnuk, Denise Kulhanek & Harold Jones

  2. Institute of Low Temperature Science, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Japan

    Osamu Seki

  3. Faculty of Environmental Earth Science, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Japan

    Masanobu Yamamoto

  4. MARUM-Center for Marine Environmental Sciences, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany

    Oscar E. Romero

  5. Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, Bremerhaven, Germany

    Oscar E. Romero

  6. Marine Palynology and Paleoceanography, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Mei Nelissen & Francesca Sangiorgi

  7. Antarctic Research Centre, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand

    Nicholas R. Golledge, Timothy Naish, Richard Levy & Robert McKay

  8. Earth Sciences New Zealand, Lower Hutt, New Zealand

    Georgia Grant, Richard Levy & Giuseppe Cortese

  9. Jackson School of Geosciences, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA

    Benjamin Keisling

  10. Department of Geoscience, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA

    Stephen Meyers & Nicholas Sullivan

  11. Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences, Rice University, Houston, TX, USA

    Jeanine Ash

  12. International Ocean Discovery Program, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA

    Denise Kulhanek

  13. Institute of Geosciences, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany

    Denise Kulhanek

  14. Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA

    Brian W. Romans & Natalia Varela Valenzuela

  15. Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA

    Natalia Varela Valenzuela

  16. Laboratoire d’Océanologie et de Géosciences, UMR 8187 CNRS/Univ Lille/ULCO, Wimereux, France

    Francois Beny

  17. College of Marine Science, University of South Florida, St. Petersburg, FL, USA

    Imogen Browne & Amelia Shevenell

  18. Geotop Research Center in Earth System Dynamics and Département des sciences de la Terre et de I’atmosphère, Université du Québec à Montréal, Montréal, Quebec, Canada

    Isobela M. C. Sousa

  19. Department of Geology and Environmental Geosciences, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL, USA

    Justin P. Dodd

  20. Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, Alfred Wegener Institute, Bremerhaven, Germany

    Oliver M. Esper

  21. School of Biological and Marine Sciences, University of Plymouth, Plymouth, UK

    Jenny Gales

  22. Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, University of Nebraska—Lincoln, Lincoln, NE, USA

    David Harwood

  23. Geological Survey of Japan, National Institute of Advanced Science and Technology, Tsukuba, Japan

    Saki Ishino & Saiko T. Sugisaki

  24. Ocean Climate Response and Ecosystem Research Department, Korea Institute of Ocean Science and Technology, Busan, Republic of Korea

    Sookwan Kim

  25. Division of Polar-Earth System Sciences, Korea Polar Research Institute, Incheon, Republic of Korea

    Sunghan Kim

  26. Department of Geosciences, University of Tromsø—the Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway

    Jan S. Laberg

  27. Department of Geosciences, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, MA, USA

    R. Mark Leckie

  28. Marine Geology, Alfred Wegener Institute, Bremerhaven, Germany

    Juliane Müller

  29. Polar Biology Lab, National Centre for Antarctic and Ocean Research, Vasco da Gama, India

    Shiv Singh

  30. Department of Botany, Institute of Science, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India

    Shiv Singh

  31. Department of Earth Science and Engineering, Imperial College London, London, UK

    Tina van de Flierdt

  32. National Oceanography Centre Southampton, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK

    Tim van Peer

  33. School of Geography, Geology and the Environment, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK

    Tim van Peer

  34. State Key Laboratory of Marine Geology, Tongji University, Shanghai, China

    Wenshen Xiao

  35. Key Laboratory of Marine Geology and Environment, Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Qingdao, China

    Zhifang Xiong

  36. Geophysics Division, Istituto Nazionale di Oceanografia e di Geofisica Sperimentale, Trieste, Italy

    Laura De Santis

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M.O.P., C.R., O.S., O.E.R., M.N., F.S., R.M., G.G. and N.R.G. designed the research in collaboration with the entire IODP expedition 374 science party. C.R. produced U1524 IBRD MAR record. O.S. and M.Y. carried out all organic geochemical analysis and produced the TEX86 and δ2H C18 fatty acid data sets. O.E.R. collected biogenic opal data. M.N. and F.S. collected palynology data. N.G. carried out ice-sheet modelling experiments. Time series analysis was carried out by M.O.P., W.D.A. and H.J. in collaboration with S.M. Age model development was carried out by G.C., D.H., D.K., R.M.L., O.R., S.T.S., T.v.P. and W.X. Sedimentological interpretations were made by M.O.P., J.A., I.C.D., S.I., B.K., Sunghan Kim, J.S.L., S.L., A.S. and S.S. Physical property data sets were developed by B.R., F.B., I.B., J.G. and Sookwam Kim. Figure 1 was created by N.R.G. Figures 2 and 3 were created by G.G. and M.O.P. R.M., G.G., B.K., T.N., R.L., S.M., N.S. and N.V. assisted in interpretations of the data. All authors contributed to drafting the manuscript. R.M. and L.D. were co-chiefs of IODP Expedition 374. All IODP Expedition 374 scientists, M.O.P., O.S., O.E.R., F.S., B.K., J.A., D.K., B.W.R., F.B., I.B., G.C., I.M.C.S., J.P.D., O.M.E., J.G., D.H., S.I., Sookwan Kim, Sunghan Kim, J.S.L., R.M.L., J.M., A.S., S.S., S.T.S., T.v.d.F., T.v.P., W.X., Z.X., L.D. and R.M. contributed to the collection of shipboard datasets and initial interpretations for Site U1524.

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Correspondence to Molly O. Patterson.

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Extended data

Extended Data Fig. 1 Lithostratigraphy, grain size and physical property data sets of the Plio-Pleistocene record of U1524.

The downcore distribution of greenish grey diatom-rich sandy mud beds coincide with an increase in coarse sand (250 um to 2 mm) and clast (>2 mm) content. Colour reflectance (b*) and physical property (NGR and MS) data highlight overall changes in lithological variability across LSUs.

Extended Data Fig. 2 Representative sequences of typical sedimentary packages.

Bed thickness of diatom-rich sandy muds increase upcore and is highlighted by color reflectance b* data (low values = yellow; high values = blue).

Extended Data Fig. 3 Comparisons of mid-Pliocene productivity and meltwater proxies in U1524 plotted against Depth CSF-B(m).

Geochemical proxies for glacial meltwater and paleontological proxies for freshwater coincide with times of increased surface ocean productivity (i.e., biogenic opal MAR).

Extended Data Fig. 4 Power spectral estimates for the untuned U1524 IBRD-MAR record.

Three noise models are used to demonstrate robustness of orbital signal embedded in time series record. Significant orbital frequencies are identified using three red noise confidence level (CL) estimates (red line58; blue line47; green line59).

Extended Data Fig. 5 LOWSPEC comparison between Pure ETP record at 5ky resolution vs ETP record with 1524 sedimentation rate/IBRD sampling interval applied.

Results demonstrate that lack of distortion on the sedimentary record related to sedimentation rates changes for a pure orbital signal. Power spectra of ETP solution for the Mid- to Late-Pliocene interval spanning U1524 IBRD record (3300-2300 ka) at 5kyr sample resolution (black) and ETP solution with U1524 sedimentation rates and sampling interval applied (blue) are plotted against LOWSPEC background (solid red) and LOWESPEC 90-95-99 Confidence Levels (dashed red) curves.

Extended Data Fig. 6 Power/Confidence heatmap plot for E-T-P solution + Noise.

Pre-whitened power and confidence level (e.g., the confidence with which we can reject the null hypothesis that a spectral peak is produced by noise alone) identified via LOWSPEC analysis59. AR1 noise coefficient (ρ) is a measure of how correlated (or “red”) added noise is. O1 and P1-P2 frequency bands are readily identified with high confidence regardless of how “red” the added noise is. E1 and P3 bands are identifiable with moderately “red” noise. E2 is most affected by the addition of highly “red” noise, but it is still identifiable up to ρ=0.2-0.3. ρ=0.0 means non-autocorrelated “white” noise; ρ=1.0 means purely autocorrelated “red” noise.

Extended Data Fig. 7 Spectral Frequency Kernel Density plots for pure E-T-P solution, as well as U1524 and U1361 IBRD records.

Frequencies are identified from LOWSPEC analysis59 of the given record plus added noise; they are significant at 85% confidence level (CL). 10000 iterations per AR1 noise coefficient (ρ) are run for each record to test the sensitivity of spectral peaks to the addition of variable “red” noise. Kernel density of frequencies identified as significant is estimated using bandwidth of 5e-4 (cycles/ka) from compiled results all iterations at a specified noise coefficient.

Extended Data Fig. 8 Relative sensitivity of WAIS and EAIS catchments to air and ocean temperature increases.

a) Percent change of the volume of grounded ice, (b) percent change in the area of floating ice, (c) average ice temperature at the bed, and (d) percent change in the average velocity at the base of the ice. All percentage values are relatively to the initial modelled state (100%) for each catchment. Brown lines denote West Antarctic catchments, blue lines show East Antarctic catchments. Vertical dashed and dotted lines at 2000 and 3000 years show respectively the start and end times of the ramped thermal forcing imposed. Totals (a, b) and averages (c, d) are calculated from all cells with non-zero ice thickness in each catchment.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information (download PDF )

Supplementary Figs. 1–8, Tables 1–4 and discussion.

Supplementary Data (download XLSX )

Grain size, geochemical and paleontological data presented in this manuscript.

41561_2025_1840_MOESM3_ESM.r

Supplementary Code for data processing and carrying out time series analysis, experiments and the identification of significant orbital frequencies.

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Patterson, M.O., Rosenberg, C., Seki, O. et al. Spatially variable response of Antarctica’s ice sheets to orbital forcing during the Pliocene. Nat. Geosci. 19, 182–188 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-025-01840-y

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