Marine microfossils (dinoflagellate cysts and planktonic foraminifera) and geochemical (XRF-Ti/Ca)-based climatic records from a core located off the Fleuve Manche (FM) paleo-mouth (MD13-3438) have revealed that sustained warm summer sea surface temperatures (SSTs) during sub-millennial climate changes within HS1 (~18–14.7 ka) may have played a key role in the FM regime related to the European Ice Sheet (EIS) melting rate. In this study, we have analyzed the MD13-3438 pollen content over the HS1 at a mean resolution of ~50 years to test whether vegetation-based air temperatures were coupled to SSTs face to this rapid climate variability. First, our results highlight two major phases of pollen sources at site MD13-3438, preventing the pollen record to be interpreted as a continuous record of the evolution of vegetation and climate occupying a single watershed across HS1. The first phase, i.e. the HS1-a interval (~18–16.8 ka), is marked by strong occurrences of boreal pollen taxa (especially Picea-Abies). Considering their spatial distribution and the coalescence of the British and Scandinavian ice sheets into the North Sea during the Last Glacial Maximum, these taxa probably originated from the North European Plain, i.e., eastern FM tributaries (east of the Rhine River), where cool-humid conditions generally prevailed. Then, the second phase, i.e. the HS1-b interval (~16.8–14.7 ka BP), is characterized by a deceleration of the EIS retreat and the drop of boreal pollen values at site MD13-3438 further signing a less influence of the upstream FM drainage system and thus a better characterization of pollen sources related with western FM tributaries. Superimposed to these two HS1 main phases, pollen fluctuations are concomitant with sub-millennial variability in the EIS deglaciation intensity. During the early HS1 (HS1-a), we discussed two short-term increases in the ratio between deciduous trees (Quercus-Corylus-Alnus) and herbaceous plants (Plantago-Amaranthaceae-Artemisia). These events were coeval with phases of increasing FM meltwater runoff and SST seasonality (i.e., dinocyst-based summer SST amplification). We associated these events with lower contribution of the upstream FM catchment as well as, possibly, atmospheric warming and regional sea-level positive oscillations. The HS1-b is composed of three main phases that appear more influenced by the downstream FM drainage system. HS1-b1 (16.8–16.3 ka BP) corresponds to the driest and coldest conditions west of the Rhine River. HS1-b2 (16.3–15.6 ka BP) is coeval with large arrivals of iceberg from the Hudson strait in the Bay of Biscay and thus likely to a major sea-level positive oscillation associated with a phase of FM valley reworking. HS1-b3 (15.6–14.7 ka BP) corresponds to persistent arid conditions that preceded the subsequent more humid conditions recorded from 14.7 ka BP at the start of the Bölling-Alleröd.

Sardine physiological measurments from september to november 2020

The Mediterranean Sea is generally described as an oligotrophic area where primary productivity is limited to a few coastal environments with nutrient-enriched fluvial input. However, several studies have revealed that the hydrology of the western Mediterranean has major seasonal productive patterns linked either to significant riverine input or to seasonal upwelling cells. This study aims to: i) discuss organic microfossils (i.e. pollen and dinoflagellate cyst assemblages, as well as other non-pollen palynomorphs) from two different productive areas of the western Mediterranean Sea, and ii) examine the importance of the interconnections between marine and continental influences responsible for modern palynomorph distributions. Based on 25 samples from the Gulf of Lion (GoL) and Algerian Margin, this study key findings are: i) that GoL marine productivity is driven by the combination of discharges from the Rhône River and seasonal upwelling mechanisms, ii) that the strong productive pattern of the northern African coast is driven by water density front mixings and related upwellings. These two patterns are discussed in the light of major links that provide a better understanding of the signatures of marine and continental bio-indicators. The dinocyst Lingulodinium machaerophorum can be considered as a tracer of Rhône River plume influence in the GoL. Brigantedinium taxa are shown to be upwelling-sensitive in both studied areas. Typical differences in vegetation across the north–south climate gradient in the western Mediterranean Basin are highlighted by the larger ratio of Euro-Siberian to Mediterranean pollen taxa in the northern sector. Synoptic maps also illustrate the complex interactions of environmental drivers determining the distributions of continental and marine palynomorphs in the western Mediterranean Sea.

Good Environmental Status assessment (GES) for descriptor 8 (contaminants, D8) of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) is reached when concentrations of contaminants are at levels not giving rise to pollution effects. It is described by 4 criteria among which the first one focus on the concentration of the contaminants in the environment (criteria 1 of the D8, D8C1). The environmental status for D8 in France includes assessment of contaminant concentrations in sediment, bivalves, fish, birds, mammals to cover the French marine area the continental shelf from the coast line). The 8 tables below present the assessment of the chemical contamination in sediment and bivalves on the coastal area of the 4 French marine subregions for D8 as part of the 2024 GES assessment. These tables report the status and temporal trends of each station x matrice x substance triplet in each of the 4 French marine subregions. Explanation on how to read the cells is given in the “read file”. The environmental assessment for D8 in France can be found in Mauffret al., 2023 (DOI:10.13155/97214). It includes 17 national indicator assessments, 4 OSPAR indicators and integrated assessment in selected assessment units at the level of the criteria 1 and 2. 

New results acquired in south-Brittany (MD08-3204 CQ core: Bay of Quiberon and VK03-58bis core: south Glénan islands) allow depicting Holocene paleoenvironmental changes from 8.5 ka BP to present through a multi-proxy dataset including sedimentological and palynological data. First, grain-size analyses and AMS-14C dates highlight a common sedimentary history for both study cores. The relative sea level (RSL) slowdown was accompanied by a significant drop of the sedimentation rates between ca. 8.3 and 5.7 ka BP, after being relatively higher at the onset of the Holocene. This interval led to the establishment of a shell-condensed level, identified in core VK03-58bis by the “Turritella layer” and interpreted as a marker for the maximum flooding surface. Palynological data (pollen grains and dinoflagellate cyst assemblages) acquired in core MD08-3204 CQ argue for an amplification of the fluvial influence since 5.7 ka BP; the establishment of the highstand system tract (i.e., mixed marine and fluviatile influences on the platform) then accompanying the slowdown of the RSL rise-rates. On the shelf, the amplification of Anthropogenic Pollen Indicators (API) is then better detected since 4.2 ka BP, not only due to human impact increase but also due to a stronger fluvial influence on the shelf during the Late Holocene. Palynological data, recorded on the 8.5–8.3 ka BP interval along an inshore-offshore gradient, also demonstrate the complexity of the palynological signal such as i) the fluvial influence that promotes some pollinic taxa (i.e., Corylus, Alnus) from proximal areas and ii) the macro-regionalization of palynomorph sources in distal cores. In addition, the comparison of palynological tracers, including API, over the last 7 kyrs, with south-Brittany coastal and mid-shelf sites subjected to northern vs. southern Loire catchment areas, allowed discussing a major hydro-climatic effect on the reconstructed palynological signals. Strengthened subpolar gyre dynamics (SPG), combined with recurrent positive North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) configurations, appear responsible for increased winter precipitations and fluvial discharges over northern Europe, such as in Brittany. Conversely, weakened SPG intervals, associated with negative NAO-like modes, are characterized by intensified winter fluvial discharges over southern Europe. Interestingly, we record, at an infra-orbital timescale, major peaks of API during periods of strengthened (/weakened) SPG dynamics in sites subjects to Brittany watersheds (/Loire watersheds) inputs.

In the mid-latitudes of the northeast Atlantic, the study of the upper branch of the AMOC is poorly documented. This study provides a complete record of the glacial, deglacial and Holocene dynamics of the easternmost portion of the upper branch of the AMOC, namely the European Slope Current and its glacial equivalent know as the Glacial Eastern Boundary Current (GEBC). To do so, we use core SU81-44 (~1000 m water depth) from the of southern Bay of Biscay (BoB)  upper slope, .The aim of this study is to reconstruct paleoenvironmental and hydrodynamic changes using a multiproxy approach (i.e. benthic foraminiferal assemblage, grain size proxies, oxygen and carbon stable isotopes, and foraminiferal εNd). During the glacial period and the onset of the deglaciation, our results show that the grain size proxies together with the relative densities of the high-energy indicator species Trifarina angulosa and the low oxygen tolerant Globobulimina spp. showed significant fluctuations. These were concomitant with the main climate changes recognized over this period and with the glacial slope paleoflow reconstruction from the northern BoB. This highlights a strong climatic/oceanographic forcing on the sedimentary characteristics of the region and a prominent forcing by changes in near-bottom flow speed. Our data also provide a new constraint on the strength of the slope current in the region during the late deglaciation and Holocene periods. We observe a reinvigoration of the upper branch of the AMOC during the Bølling-Allerød warming, preceding the abrupt resumption of the deeper branch of the AMOC in the western North Atlantic. This seems to confirm the crucial role of the European Slope Current in deep water formation, as it is the case today. Finally, our data show a progressive weakening of the ESC during the Holocene and we hypothesize a link with the long-term dynamics of the subpolar gyre.

The data file present detailed individual congener/compound concentrations  for a large variety of hydrophobic organic contaminants including polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), organochlorine pesticides (OCPs), legacy and alternative brominated flame retardants (BFRs) and per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) in meso- and bathypelagic organisms collected in the Bay of Biscay, northeast Atlantic, in October 2017. The studied species include 3 crustacean species (Pasiphaea sivado, Sergia robusta, Ephyrina figueirai) and 11 fish species (Xenodermichthys copei, Searsia koefoedi, Myctophum punctatum, Notoscopelus kroeyeri, Lampanyctus crocodilus, Argyropelecus olfersii, Arctozenus risso, Stomias boa, Serrivomer beanii, Chauliodus sloani, Aphanopus carbo). The organisms were collected at night during one single trawling using a 25 m vertical opening pelagic trawl in the deep scattering layer (ca 800 m depth in the water column; 1330 m bottom floor). This dataset was used in the article entitled "A large diversity of organohalogen contaminants reach the meso- and bathypelagic organisms in the Bay of Biscay (northeast Atlantic)" published in Marine Pollution Bulletin.

Key physico-chemical parameters (salinity, temperature, turbidity and dissolved oxygen) were measured in surface water during longitudinal transects in the Loire and Gironde estuaries in summers 2017 and 2018. This objective of this work was to determine the distribution of the dissolved oxygen and to detect potential severe desoxygenation. The transects were scheduled in order to begin the measurements at high tide from a site located upstream of an area where severe deoxygenation have been already been reported. Then, the transect was realised by sailing at low speed downstream with a multiparameter probe SAMBAT, maintained at 0.5 m below the surface, that collected a measurement every 2 minutes.

This set of data documents the radiocarbon dates (n=19) obtained thanks to the accelerator mass spectrometry method (AMS) at the LMC14/ARTEMIS French national facility on the cores (Multicorer, Kullenberg) retrieved from the West-Gironde mud patch (WGMP) during the JERICObent-7 cruise (10-15 July 2019; NR Côtes de la Manche, https://doi.org/10.17600/18001022). The WGMP registers very high sedimentation rates since the last 600 years (≥ 0.3 cm/yr) and is thus of great interest for palaeoceanographic investigations. At present, this depocenter marks the mid-shelf of the temperate Bay of Biscay off major French rivers from the Aquitaine basin. The fine mud deposits of the WGMP are of 3 to 4 meters thick and lie on palimpsest levels rich in gravels and shells. They cover a V-shaped structure, oriented SW-NE, which is attributed to the incision(s) of a paleovalley in the Cenozoic substrate, mainly linked to the paleo-Gironde routing changes during past glacials/interglacials, and its potential past convergences with the paleo-rivers of the Antioche perthuis (Seudre, Charente paleovalleys?) at that times. Detailed information on each sample is presented with the 14C results obtained by the Artemis AMS facility at LMC14 laboratory (Dumoulin et al. 2017- https://doi.org/10.1017/RDC.2016.116, Beck et al. 2024- https://doi.org/10.1017/RDC.2023.23). Raw ages are indicated together with calibration calculations using the last two versions of the Calib software (http://calib.org/, Calib 7 and 8) to show the dispersion of ages linked to the updating of calibration curves (Marine13, Intcal13, Marine20, Intcal 20). The calibrated ages finally retained for publications (used in the related Seanoe document - https://doi.org/10.17882/104237 - and published in Eynaud et al., 2025 for the ST3c core, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloplacha.2025.105039) are those obtained with the last Calib 8.1 version. Raw 14C ages were calibrated and converted to calendar ages using the IntCal20 calibration curve with a reservoir age correction of 400 years deduced from Radionuclide analyses (137Cs and 210Pb) at the top of the studied cores (see Schmidt, 2025, https://www.seanoe.org/data/00968/107979/). 

Particularly suited to the purpose of measuring the sensitivity of benthic communities to trawling, a trawl disturbance indicator (de Juan and Demestre, 2012, de Juan et al. 2009) was proposed based on benthic species life history traits to evaluate the sensibility of mega- and epifaunal community to fishing pressure known to have a physical impact on the seafloor (such as dredging and bottom trawling). The selected biological traits were chosen as they determine vulnerability to trawling: mobility, fragility, position on substrata, average size and feeding mode that can easily be related to the fragility, recoverability and vulnerability ecological concepts. Life history traits of species have been defined from the BIOTIC database (MARLIN, 2014) and from information given by Le Pape et al. (2007), Brindamour et al. (2009) and Garcia (2010). For missing life history traits, additional information from literature has been considered. The five categories retained are life history functional traits that were selected based on the knowledge of the response of benthic taxa to trawling disturbance (de Juan and Demestre, 2012). They reflect respectively the possibility to avoid direct gear impact, to benefit from trawling for feeding, to escape gear, to get caught by the net and to resist trawling/dredging action, each of these characteristics being either advantageous or sensitive to trawling. Then, to allow quantitative analysis, a score was assigned to each category: from low vulnerability (0) to high vulnerability (3). The five categories scores were then summed for each taxon (the highly vulnerable taxon could reach the maximum score is 15) and this value may be considered as a species index of sensitivity to trawling disturbance. The scores of 812 taxa commonly found in bottom trawl by-catch in the southern North Sea, English Channel and north-western Mediterranean were described.