Five million years of Antarctic Circumpolar Current strength variability.

The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) represents the world's largest ocean-current system and affects global ocean circulation, climate and Antarctic ice-sheet stability. Today, ACC dynamics are controlled by atmospheric forcing, oceanic density gradients and eddy activity. Whereas palaeoceanographic reconstructions exhibit regional heterogeneity in ACC position and strength over Pleistocene glacial-interglacial cycles, the long-term evolution of the ACC is poorly known.