Laminated Sediments from Levinson-Lessing Lake, Northern Central Siberia - A 30,000 Year Record of Environmental History?

Sediment description and initial stratigraphical, geochemical, and physical analyses were carried out on a 22.4 m long sediment core from the arctic Levinson-Lessing Lake, Taymyr Peninsula (northern Central Siberia). The results reveal a continuous sedimentary history of the lake and its dependence on climatic variations since the late Middle Weichselian. The core consists of two major sediment types, clastic varves and sandy layers, which are linked to seasonal sediment supply related to meltwater runoff and episodic events related to turbidity currents, respectively. Higher frequencies of the event deposits during the Weichselian were presumably initiated by a lower lake level. Climatic warming at the Pleistocene-Holocene transition led to increased biogenic accumulation, originating from both aquatic production and terrestrial supply, but to no significant change in sedimentation rates. From the available data, a glaciation in the lake’s catchment area can be excluded during the period since the late Middle Weichselian.