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Younger Dryas
Younger Dryas, also called Younger Dryas stadial,
cool period between roughly 12,900 and 11,600 years
ago that disrupted the prevailing warming trend
occurring in the Northern Hemisphere at the end of
the Pleistocene Epoch (which lasted from 2.6 million
Younger Dryas event to 11,700 years ago). The Younger Dryas was
characterized by cooler average temperatures that
returned parts of Europe and North America to ice age conditions. The onset of the
Younger Dryas took less than 100 years, and the period persisted for roughly 1,300 years.
After the period ended, an interval of rapid warming followed, and average temperatures
increased to near present-day levels. The Younger Dryas was named after Dryas
octopetala, a pale yellow wildflower of the rose family, typical of cold open Arctic
environments.

During the Pleistocene Epoch, extensive ice sheets and other glaciers formed repeatedly on
large landmasses. The Younger Dryas, one of several very abrupt climatic changes that
took place near the end of the late Pleistocene, was preceded by a sudden warming interval
beginning approximately 14,700 years ago. This interval, the Bølling-Allerød interstadial,
saw the rapid retreat of the immense Pleistocene ice sheets. A second abrupt climatic
warming event, approximately 11,600 years ago, marked the end of the Younger Dryas and
the beginning of the Holocene Epoch (11,700 years ago to the present) and Earth’s modern
climate. There is evidence that this warming was quite rapid; Greenland ice-core samples
suggest that local temperatures increased by up to 10 °C (18 °F) in just a few decades.

Cause
Such dramatic climatic reversals occurring in such a short time cannot be explained by
Milankovitch cycles (that is, cyclical changes to the shape of Earth’s orbit, the tilt of
Earth’s axis, and the wobblelike movement of Earth on its axis with respect to the Sun),
which play out over tens of thousands of years. A number of hypotheses have been
proposed to explain the Younger Dryas, but so far there is no consensus on its cause.

The leading hypothesis, first proposed by Finnish scientist Claes Rooth in 1982 and later
expanded by American climatologist Wallace Broecker and others, postulated that large
amounts of fresh water were discharged into the North Atlantic about 12,800 years ago.

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More specifically, the retreat of the Laurentide Ice Sheet allowed Lake Agassiz, a glacial
meltwater lake that covered a large part of north-central North America, to drain eastward
into the Atlantic Ocean rather than southward into the Mississippi River. Broecker and
American geologist George Denton proposed that this large influx of fresh water may have
stopped higher-density seawater in the North Atlantic from descending to lower depths,
thereby interrupting thermohaline circulation (a system of surface and deepwater currents
that distributes large amounts of heat around the globe) and initiating a short-term return to
glacial conditions.

Some studies have noted the occurrence of similar freshwater pulses entering the Atlantic
from the Mackenzie River in northern Canada. Such pulses may have slowed thermohaline
circulation. Other hypotheses suggest that volcanic eruptions, negative radiative forcing, a
large comet impact, modified atmospheric circulation patterns from the changing shape of
the ice cap, or an extended period of reduced sunspot activity may have played significant
roles in bringing about the Younger Dryas.
Initial discovery and subsequent research
The first evidence of the Younger Dryas came from ice cores taken from European
maritime environments dating to the late Pleistocene. The ice cores showed that the
warming process produced abrupt wholesale melting of late Pleistocene glaciers.
Subsequent examination of terrestrial plants and pollen in the cores indicated that forests
were replaced by tundra vegetation during a cool period.

The timing of past climatic fluctuations has been determined by measuring the ratio of two
oxygen isotopes, oxygen-18 and oxygen-16, present in air bubbles trapped in different
layers of the ice. Isotope data suggests that central Greenland was nearly 14 °C (24.5 °F)
colder during the Younger Dryas than it is today and that the sudden warming that ended
the Younger Dryas took about 40 to 50 years.

Geographic extent
Radiocarbon dating of glacial moraines, measurements of oxygen isotopes in ice cores and
in stalactites and stalagmites in caves, and pollen records indicate that climate shifts of
various kinds took place during the Younger Dryas throughout the globe. Data show that
the cooling was limited primarily to the Northern Hemisphere, specifically the North
Atlantic region, which included Europe and eastern North America. Evidence of advancing
continental ice sheets coincident with the Younger Dryas is reported from the Scandinavian
Ice Sheet, the Laurentide Ice Sheet in eastern North America, the Cordilleran Ice Sheet in
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western North America, and the Siberian Ice Sheet in Russia. Alpine glaciers in the
Northern Hemisphere responded to the abrupt cooling by expanding. Evidence for this
appears in many places in the Rocky Mountains of the United States and Canada, the
Cascade Range of Washington state, and the European Alps. Abrupt shifts in the plant
communities in California and other parts of the southwestern United States have been
linked to the onset of prolonged cooler and drier conditions coinciding with the beginning
of the interval.

Researchers estimate that sea surface temperatures in eastern Canada declined by 5–10 °C
(9–18 °F) during the Younger Dryas. Away from the western part of the North Atlantic, sea
surface temperature declines were not as great; temperatures in the Mediterranean Sea fell
by only 1–3 °C (1.8–5.4 °F), and the waters in Venezuela’s Cariaco Basin and along the
coast of northern California cooled by about 3 °C (5.4 °F).

Many parts of the tropics and the Southern Hemisphere became warmer and wetter during
the Younger Dryas. Evidence of sea surface temperature increases occur in the Caribbean
Sea, the eastern equatorial Atlantic Ocean, and the tropical Pacific Ocean. Studies of high-
altitude regions of the Southern Hemisphere—such as the Bolivian, Peruvian, and
Patagonian Andes and the Southern Alps of New Zealand—reveal evidence of warmer
conditions and declining glacier coverage.
The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica This article was most recently revised and updated by John P.
Rafferty.

Citation Information
Article Title: Younger Dryas
Website Name: Encyclopaedia Britannica
Publisher: Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
Date Published: 07 June 2023
URL: https://www.britannica.comhttps://www.britannica.com/science/Younger-Dryas-climate-interval
Access Date: August 02, 2023

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