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Mulitza, Stefan; Heslop, David; Pittauerova, Daniela; Fischer, Helmut W; Meyer, Inka; Stuut, Jan-Berend W; Zabel, Matthias; Mollenhauer, Gesine; Collins, James A; Kuhnert, Henning; Schulz, Michael (2010): Chemistry and grain-size distribution of terrigenous sediments deposited at Site GeoB9501 [dataset publication series]. PANGAEA, https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742939, Supplement to: Mulitza, S et al. (2010): Increase in African dust flux at the onset of commercial agriculture in the Sahel region. Nature, 466, 226-228, https://doi.org/10.1038/nature09213

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Abstract:
The Sahara Desert is the largest source of mineral dust in the world. Emissions of African dust increased sharply in the early 1970s, a change that has been attributed mainly to drought in the Sahara/Sahel region caused by changes in the global distribution of sea surface temperature. The human contribution to land degradation and dust mobilization in this region remains poorly understood, owing to the paucity of data that would allow the identification of long-term trends in desertification. Direct measurements of airborne African dust concentrations only became available in the mid-1960s from a station on Barbados and subsequently from satellite imagery since the late 1970s: they do not cover the onset of commercial agriculture in the Sahel region ~170 years ago. Here we construct a 3,200-year record of dust deposition off northwest Africa by investigating the chemistry and grain-size distribution of terrigenous sediments deposited at a marine site located directly under the West African dust plume. With the help of our dust record and a proxy record for West African precipitation we find that, on the century scale, dust deposition is related to precipitation in tropical West Africa until the seventeenth century. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, a sharp increase in dust deposition parallels the advent of commercial agriculture in the Sahel region. Our findings suggest that human-induced dust emissions from the Sahel region have contributed to the atmospheric dust load for about 200 years.
Project(s):
Geosciences, University of Bremen (GeoB)
Coverage:
Median Latitude: 16.840227 * Median Longitude: -16.732756 * South-bound Latitude: 16.839660 * West-bound Longitude: -16.732830 * North-bound Latitude: 16.840660 * East-bound Longitude: -16.732660
Date/Time Start: 2005-06-12T20:01:00 * Date/Time End: 2005-06-12T21:10:00
Event(s):
GeoB9501-4 (286) * Latitude: 16.839660 * Longitude: -16.732660 * Date/Time: 2005-06-12T20:01:00 * Elevation: -330.0 m * Location: Mauritania Canyon * Campaign: M65/1 * Basis: Meteor (1986) * Method/Device: MultiCorer (MUC) * Comment: 45-47 cm
GeoB9501-5 (286) * Latitude: 16.840660 * Longitude: -16.732830 * Date/Time: 2005-06-12T21:10:00 * Elevation: -323.0 m * Recovery: 5.32 m * Location: Mauritania Canyon * Campaign: M65/1 * Basis: Meteor (1986) * Method/Device: Gravity corer (Kiel type) (SL) * Comment: geology, 532 cm
License:
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported (CC-BY-3.0)
Size:
15 datasets

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Datasets listed in this publication series

  1. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure 2) Composite of aeolian flux at site GeoB9501. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742931
  2. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure 2) Composite of aeolian proportion at site GeoB9501. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742928
  3. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure S2) Composite of dry bulk density at site GeoB9501. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742937
  4. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure S2) Composite of fluvial flux at site GeoB9501. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742932
  5. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): Composite of fluvial proportion at site GeoB9501. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742929
  6. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure 2) Composite of grain size of the terrigenous fraction at site GeoB9501. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742934
  7. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure S2) Composite of marine flux at site GeoB9501. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742933
  8. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): Composite of marine proportion at site GeoB9501. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742930
  9. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure S2) Composite of sedimentation rate derived from weighted polynomialy at site GeoB9501. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742938
  10. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure S3) Bulk element concentrations from multicore GeoB9501-4 measured with EDP-XRF spectroscopy. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742925
  11. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure S1) 210Pbxs- and 137Cs data from multicore GeoB9501-4. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742935
  12. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure S3) Bulk element concentrations from gravity core GeoB9501-5 measured with EDP-XRF spectroscopy. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742924
  13. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): Calibrated elemental proportions from gravity core GeoB9501-5. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742926
  14. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): (Figure S1) 210Pbxs- and 137Cs data from gravity core GeoB9501-5. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742936
  15. Mulitza, S; Heslop, D; Pittauerova, D et al. (2010): Element intensities from gravity core GeoB9501-5 measured with Avaatech XRF core scanner. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.742923