Millennial-Scale Dynamics of Southern Amazonian Rain Forests

Amazonian rain forest-savanna boundaries are highly sensitive to climatic change and may also play an important role in rain forest speciation. However, their dynamics over millennial time scales are poorly understood. Here, we present late Quaternary pollen records from the southern margin of Amazo...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science) 2000-12, Vol.290 (5500), p.2291-2294
Main Authors: Mayle, Francis E., Burbridge, Rachel, Killeen, Timothy J.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Biodiversity
Biological diversity
Bolivia
Climate
Climate change
Community Relations
Coniferous forests
Dry forests
Earth sciences
Earth, ocean, space
Ecosystem
Exact sciences and technology
Fossils
Geologic Sediments
Holocene
Marine and continental quaternary
Paleoclimatology
Pleistocene
Pollen
Quaternary
Radiocarbon
Rain
Rain forest ecology
Rainforests
Savannas
Sediments
South America, Amazon R. Basin
Surficial geology
Time Factors
Trees
Tropical rain forests
Upwelling water
Vegetation
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Summary:Amazonian rain forest-savanna boundaries are highly sensitive to climatic change and may also play an important role in rain forest speciation. However, their dynamics over millennial time scales are poorly understood. Here, we present late Quaternary pollen records from the southern margin of Amazonia, which show that the humid evergreen rain forests of eastern Bolivia have been expanding southward over the past 3000 years and that their present-day limit represents the southernmost extent of Amazonian rain forest over at least the past 50,000 years. This rain forest expansion is attributed to increased seasonal latitudinal migration of the Intertropical Convergence Zone, which can in turn be explained by Milankovitch astronomic forcing.
ISSN:0036-8075
1095-9203
DOI:10.1126/science.290.5500.2291