Efforts to understand how Pleistocene climate changes were translated into fluctuations in ice sheet extent and volume are limited by a lack of consensus about the glacial history of the North Sea. Here, we use high-resolution 3D seismic data to interpret the landforms and sediments of the central North Sea in unprecedented detail. In contrast to previous interpretations of multiple extensive early glaciations, our data suggest that grounded ice extended across the central North Sea only once, from western Norway, during the Early Pleistocene. This ice sheet advance, which probably occurred ~1.1 million years ago, deposited an up to 120-meter-thick layer of till across >10,000 square kilometers of the central basin. During the rest of the Early Pleistocene, elliptical pockmarks and elongate contour-current furrows show that the central basin was instead scoured by along-slope currents. These findings constrain the extent of ice sheets before and during the Mid-Pleistocene Transition and reconcile marine and terrestrial evidence for glaciation in northwest Europe.

中文翻译：

---

北海中部单次早更新世冰期的 3D 地震证据


由于对北海冰川历史缺乏共识，了解更新世气候变化如何转化为冰盖范围和体积波动的努力受到限制。在这里，我们使用高分辨率 3D 地震数据以前所未有的细节解读北海中部的地貌和沉积物。与以前对多个广泛早期冰期作用的解释相反，我们的数据表明，在早更新世期间，接地冰只从挪威西部延伸到北海中部一次。这种冰盖推进可能发生在 ~110 万年前，在中央盆地的 >10,000 平方公里处沉积了一层厚达 120 米的冰碛层。在早更新世的其余时间里，椭圆形的麻点和细长的等高流沟表明，中央盆地反而被沿坡流冲刷。这些发现限制了更新世中期过渡之前和期间冰盖的范围，并调和了西北欧冰川作用的海洋和陆地证据。