Five million years of Antarctic Circumpolar Current strength variability.

The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) represents the world's largest ocean-current system and affects global ocean circulation, climate and Antarctic ice-sheet stability. Today, ACC dynamics are controlled by atmospheric forcing, oceanic density gradients and eddy activity. Whereas palaeoceanographic reconstructions exhibit regional heterogeneity in ACC position and strength over Pleistocene glacial-interglacial cycles, the long-term evolution of the ACC is poorly known.

Orbital- and millennial-scale Antarctic Circumpolar Current variability in Drake Passage over the past 140,000 years.

The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) plays a crucial role in global ocean circulation by fostering deep-water upwelling and formation of new water masses. On geological time-scales, ACC variations are poorly constrained beyond the last glacial. Here, we reconstruct changes in ACC strength in the central Drake Passage in vicinity of the modern Polar Front over a complete glacial-interglacial cycle (i.