High resolution climatic and environmental changes in Shandong Peninsula during the last glacial maximum

The last glacial maximum is the most cold-dry period on the Earth's surface since the last glaciation. We reconstructed high-resolution summer monsoon changes over the Shandong Peninsula during the period of 23.2～18.8 ka using precisely-dated high-resolution oxygen and carbon isotopes (δ¹⁸O and δ¹³C). Results show that the summer monsoon climate in the last glacial maximum in Shandong Peninsula had significant millennial scale fluctuations, and REDFIT analysis shows a significant 2.2 ka cycle in both oxygen and carbon isotopes, which was in a cold-dry state in general, and can be subdivided into four stages, namely, cold and dry (23.2～22 ka), relatively warm and wet (22～21 k), cold and dry (21～19 ka), and relatively warm and wet (21～19 ka). The newly obtained δ¹⁸O record is generally similar to other records of stalagmite δ¹⁸O from monsoonal China, as well as the stalagmite δ¹⁸O records from northern Borneo in the Western Pacific Warm Pool (WPWP). The climate and environment changes in the WPWP might have exerted a substantial impact on summer monsoon climate over the Shandong Peninsula during the last glacial maximum. It is speculated that temperature change at sea surface of WPWP affected the atmospheric circulation and Kuroshio, which should be the main mechanism sending climate and environment signals from low latitude to middle-high latitude zones in the northern hemisphere.