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Summary: Caribbean and Pacific moisture sources on the Isthmus of Panama
revealed from stalagmite and surface water d18
O gradients
Matthew S. Lachniet,1
William P. Patterson,2
Steve Burns,3
Yemane Asmerom,4
and Victor Polyak4
Received 17 October 2006; revised 21 November 2006; accepted 30 November 2006; published 11 January 2007.
[1] We test the hypothesis that the Pacific Ocean
contributes moisture to the Intertropical Convergence
Zone (ITCZ) over southern Central America, by spatial
analysis of surface water d18
O values from Panama and
Costa Rica. The d18
O values decrease with distance from
the Caribbean Sea to the isthmian divide then gradually
increase from the divide toward the Pacific slope, which
suggests a contribution of both Caribbean and Pacific
sourced moisture to the isthmus. We estimated the Pacific
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