Possible links between methane seepages and glacial-interglacial transitions in the South China Sea

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Here we present an example of continuous geochemical data of seep carbonates from a drill core from the South China Sea, which reveals three stages of methane seepage linked to the dissociation of biogenic methane hydrate: ~130.3 ka BP before, MIS 5 (~130.3 to 111.4 ka BP) and MIS 1 (~11.1 to 10.0 ka BP). Our results evidence that methane seepage was induced by warm seawater during deglaciations. We suspect this process to occur in other world regions and infer that cold seep activities might occur more widespread at glacial-interglacial transitions, which in turn might have accelerated global warming.

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