Interactive comment on “Surface-circulation change in the Southern Ocean across the Middle Eocene Climatic Optimum: inferences from dinoflagellate cysts and biomarker paleothermometry” by Margot J. Cramwinckel et al.

Abstract

The Middle Eocene Climatic Optimum (MECO) is a global warming event at about 40 Ma that interrupted the long-term Cenozoic cooling trend. Up to now only a few studies have focused with enough resolution to evaluate the paleoenvironmental and paleobiotic consequences of this hyperthermal event. In this work Cramwinckel and co-authors have investigated the paleoecological and paleoceanographic repercussions of the MECO in the Southweast Pacific Ocean (SWPO) primarily based on organic walleddinoflagellate cysts (dinocysts) and TEX86 palaeothermometry. The most important site analysed in this study is the ODP Site 1170 located on the western side of the South Tasman Rise (STR). The area where this site was drilled is characterised by a notably high sedimentation rate, especially the stratigraphical interval here interpreted as part of the middle Eocene including the MECO.