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Climate

The global climate became more seasonal and continued an overall drying and cooling trend which began during the Paleogene. The Early Miocene was relatively cool; Early Miocene mid-latitude seawater and continental thermal gradients were already very similar to those of the present. During the Middle Miocene, Earth entered a warm phase known as the Middle Miocene Climatic Optimum (MMCO), which was driven by the emplacement of the Columbia River Basalt Group. Around 11 Ma, the Middle Miocene Warm Interval gave way to the much cooler Late Miocene. The ice caps on both poles began to grow and thicken, a process enhanced by positive feedbacks from increased formation of sea ice. Between 7 and 5.3 Ma, a decrease in global temperatures termed the Late Miocene Cooling (LMC) ensued, driven by decreases in carbon dioxide concentrations. During the Pliocene, from about 5.3 to 2.7 Ma, another warm interval occurred, being known as the Pliocene Warm Interval (PWI), interrupting the longer-term cooling trend. The Pliocene Thermal Maximum (PTM) occurred between 3.3 and 3.0 Ma. During the Pliocene, Green Sahara phases of wet conditions in North Africa were frequent and occurred about every 21 kyr, being especially intense when Earth's orbit's eccentricity was high. The PWI had similar levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide to contemporary times and is often seen as an analogous climate to the projected climate of the near future as a result of anthropogenic global warming. Towards the end of the Pliocene, decreased heat transport towards the Antarctic resulting from a weakening of the Indonesian Throughflow (ITF) cooled the Earth, a process that exacerbated itself in a positive feedback as sea levels dropped and the ITF diminished and further limited the heat transported southward by the Leeuwin Current. By the end of the period the first of a series of glaciations of the current Ice Age began.