spruce trees from a melting ice patch evidence for holocene climatic change in the colorado rocky mountains usa in september 2006 we found the remains of timber sized spruce trees picea engelmannii on the floors of melting ice patches at altitudes of 3465 3480 m in the mummy range of north central colorado the ice patches occupy northeast facing recesses in which windblown snow scoured from a tundra upland to the southwest accumulates deeply we hypothesize that the upland was timbered during the early to middle holocene dense forest vegetation intercepted snow preventing it from blowing to the recesses and allowing trees to become established there neoglacial cooling led to gradual deforestation of the upland renewed transport and deposition of snow by wind and death of the ice patch trees radiocarbon dates show that the trees died between 3860 15 and 3780 20 14c yr bp c 4200 cal yr bp the trunks show decay similar to that of historic log structures built above timberline during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries suggesting that they have been protected by ice for all but a

lithology sedimentology and genesis of the wadena drumlin field minnesota u s a abstract studies on both the regional and small scales of the lithology sedimentology and stratigraphy of the wadena drumlin field in central minnesota u s a provide insights to the processes that operated within the wadena lobe during the drumlin forming phase horizontal changes in the down glacier direction in the nature of the drumlin till include an increase in the carbonate content decrease in grain size and magnetite content and variations in fine fraction mineralogy these changes also occur with depth at individual sites it is inferred that these patterns reflect progressive incorporation and mixing of the substrate which for much of the drumlin field is a till of northwestern origin with the till already in transit within the base of the wadena lobe derived from the northeast factors contributing to enhanced erosion within the wadena drumlin field include increased vertical strain rates over a major subglacial highland the presence of deformable bed material and a lowered ice profile which permitted elevated rates of bed deformation the patterns of mixing are generally consistent with substrate incorporation either by regelation or in the context of a deforming bed although neither of these processes adequately explain all of the observed features of the drumlin till where localized departures from the generalized pattern exist it can be shown that these are the result of either syn or post depositional processes primarily winnowing or the influence of a different substrate additional data are presented including macrofabric measurements and detailed site descriptions that are consistent with an accretionary progressive build up of the drumlin forms

enamel diagenesis at south african australopith sites implications for paleoecological reconstruction with trace elements abstract elemental ratio data from archaeological and paleontological bone have often been used for paleoecological reconstruction but recent studies have shown that even when solubility profiling techniques are employed in an attempt to recover biogenic signals bone is an unreliable material as a result there has been renewed interest in using enamel for such studies as it is known to be less susceptible to diagenesis nevertheless enamel is not immune from diagenetic processes and several studies have suggested that paleoecologically relevant elements may be altered in fossil enamel here we investigate sr ba zn and pb compositions of enamel from south african karstic cave sites in an effort to ascertain whether or not this material provides reliable paleoecological information we compared enamel data for mammals from three fossil sites aged 1 8 3 0 ma all of which are on dolomites with data from modern mammals living on dolomitic and granitic substrates sr ca and ba ca are about three times higher in enamel from modern mammals on granites than those living on dolomites stressing the need for geologically appropriate modern fossil comparisons after pretreatment with dilute acid we found no evidence of increased sr ca ba ca or pb ca in fossil enamel in contrast zn ca increased by over five times at one site makapansgat but much more subtly elsewhere ecological patterning in sr ca ba ca and sr ba ratios was also retained in fossil enamel this study suggests that sr ca ba ca and pb ca data likely preserve paleoecological information from these sites but also demonstrates that geologically similar sites can differ in the degree to which they impart certain elements zn in this case to fossils thus screening is probably necessary on a site by site basis lastly further investigation of elemental distributions in modern foodwebs is necessary before elemental ratio analysis can become a common tool for paleoecological reconstruction

early diagenesis of bone and tooth apatite in fluvial and marine settings constraints from combined oxygen isotope nitrogen and ree analysis abstract fossil bones and teeth of late pleistocene terrestrial mammals from rhine river gravels rs and the north sea ns that have been exposed to chemically and isotopically distinct diagenetic fluids fresh water versus seawater were investigated to study the effects of early diagenesis on biogenic apatite changes in phosphate oxygen isotopic composition 18opo4 nitrogen content wt n and rare earth element ree concentrations were measured along profiles within bones that have not been completely fossilized and in skeletal tissues bone dentine enamel with different susceptibilities to diagenetic alteration early diagenetic changes of elemental and isotopic compositions of apatite in fossil bone are related to the loss of the stabilizing collagen matrix the ree concentration is negatively correlated with the nitrogen content and therefore the amount of collagen provides a sensitive proxy for early diagenetic alteration ree patterns of rs and ns bones indicate initial fossilization in a fresh water fluid with similar ree compositions bones from both settings have nearly collagen free ree u f and sr enriched altered outer rims while the collagen bearing bone compacta in the central part often display early diagenetic pyrite void fillings however ns bones exposed to holocene seawater have outer rim 18opo4 values that are 1 1 to 2 6 higher compared to the central part of the same bones 18opo4 18 2 0 9 n 19 surprisingly even the collagen rich bone compacta with low ree contents and apatite crystallinity seems altered as ns tooth enamel 18opo4 15 0 0 3 n 4 has about 3 lower 18opo4 values values that are also similar to those of enamel from rs teeth therefore ree concentration n content and apatite crystallinity are in this case only poor proxies for the alteration of 18opo4 values seawater exposure of a few years up to 8 kyr can change the 18opo4 values of the bone apatite by 3 therefore bones fossilized in marine settings must be treated with caution for palaeoclimatic reconstructions however enamel seems to preserve pristine 18opo4 values on this time scale using species specific calibrations for modern mammals a mean 18oh2o value can be reconstructed for late pleistocene mammalian drinking water of around 9 2 0 5 which is similar to that of late pleistocene groundwater from central europe

sediment accumulation and mercury hg flux in avicennia marina forest of deep bay china abstract to investigate the rate of sediment accumulation and mercury hg flux in avicennia marina forest of deep bay china sediment cores were analyzed the results showed that hg concentrations were much higher at all depths compared to the background level a high correlation between hg and total organic carbon toc indicated their similar anthropogenic origin sedimentation rate was estimated to be 1 38 cm a 1 by 210pb geochronology the increase in the mass sediment accumulation rates was rapid range 0 5 0 94 g cm 2 a 1 and the hg fluxes ranged between 76 and 116 ng cm 2 a 1 during the last three decades the reduction in both hg concentrations and flux during the last decade may be due to the adoption of contamination control policies our results support the notion that the hg fluxes determined from the sediment cores reveal the effects of anthropogenic influences from the areas around deep bay

reevaluation of the oxygen isotopic composition of planktonic foraminifera experimental results and revised paleotemperature equations cultured planktonic foraminifera orbulina universa symbiotic and globigerina bulloides nonsymbiotic are used to reexamine temperature 18o relationships at 15 25 c relationships for both species can be described by linear equations equations for o universa grown under low light ll and high light hl share a slope of 4 80 0 21 c 1 with a hl ll offset of 0 33 due to symbiont photosynthetic activity the effect of co32 on o universa is 0 002 mol 1 kg 1 and is insensitive to temperature for g bulloides ontogenetic effects produce size related trends in temperature 18o whereby larger shells are enriched in 18o relative to smaller specimens the o universa temperature 18o relationships are more accurate than previously published equations for describing plankton tow data our equations do not explain planktonic core top data with the same precision but provide a good fit to benthic cibicidoides data below 10 c temperature 18o relationships for g bulloides provide good agreement with field data for this species from the northeast pacific

the assessment of ree patterns and 143nd 144nd ratios in fish remains abstract the ree content and isotopic composition of sr and nd have been determined in fish teeth ranging in age from the trias to the present and from various localities mostly around the atlantic these measurements have been carried out on selachian and teleost remains from the same locality in togo and show no appreciable difference which suggests with the help of a mass balance calculation of the ce anomaly that diagenetic effects are not responsible for the ree enrichment of biogenic phosphates one group of fossil teeth has about 3 times the ree abundances of shale and a shale normalized pattern with a minimum at sm it is thought to reflect deposition in the open sea environment a second group has ree concentration about 10 times higher than the first group with either a regular light ree enrichment or more frequently a maximum in the middle ree both being probably indicative of deposition in estuarine or near shore conditions the shape of the ree spectra and the size of the ce anomaly can be used semi quantitatively to determine the depth of deposition the results presented here on late cretaceous eocene fish teeth samples from morocco reflect an increasing influx of deep waters with a lowla yb ratio and strong negative ce anomaly which agrees well with the evolution of sediment chemistry and microfauna associations in contrast nd is typical of the water mass in which the fish debris decayed examples of nearly isolated basins identified with nd isotopes include the south atlantic prior to the lutetian nd 13 5 the miocene persian gulf nd 3 1 and bolivia during the late cretaceous nd 12 8 togo and guinea bissau results suggest that in the south atlantic the meridional oceanic circulation had not started before 45 ma ago combination of ree and nd data suggests that the assignment of jurassic cretaceous samples measured so far to open sea water masses is still ambiguous

evidence from shark teeth for a brackish arctic ocean in the eocene greenhouse temperatures are rising at an unprecedented rate in the arctic and affecting the sensitive hydrological cycle with increased freshwater inputs to the marine environment a deep time analogue often used to understand and predict the environmental and ecological impacts of global warming is the early middle eocene greenhouse ca 53 38 ma although the terrestrial arctic during this interval is well documented marine records are rare and largely based on one central arctic ocean site at lomonosov ridge here we estimate a mean paleosalinity of 12 7 psu for coastal waters of the western arctic ocean by incorporating 18 o co 3 values of shark teeth with estimates of eocene arctic paleotemperature and freshwater 18 o values into a salinity model this paleosalinity is substantially lower than estimates by others for the eocene central arctic ocean 21 25 psu and today9s arctic ocean 32 35 psu our results provide the first eocene salinity estimate for the western arctic ocean and when considered with prior results from lomonosov ridge suggest a reduced surface salinity but larger salinity gradient 10 psu across the eocene arctic ocean during the early middle eocene greenhouse from an ecologic perspective while today9s lamniform sharks are largely intolerant of low salinity eocene species were abundant in the brackish arctic ocean suggesting that past environmental tolerances were much greater than today

nd and sr isotope compositions in modern and fossil bones proxies for vertebrate provenance and taphonomy abstract rare earth elements ree while not essential for the physiologic functions of animals are ingested and incorporated in ppb concentrations in bones and teeth nd isotope compositions of modern bones of animals from isotopically distinct habitats demonstrate that the 143 nd 144 nd of the apatite can be used as a fingerprint for bedrock geology or ambient water mass this potentially allows the provenance and migration of extant vertebrates to be traced similar to the use of sr isotopes although ree may be enriched by up to 5 orders of magnitude during diagenesis and recrystallization of bone apatite in vivo 143 nd 144 nd may be preserved in the inner cortex of fossil bones or enamel however tracking the provenance of ancient or extinct vertebrates is possible only for well preserved archeological and paleontological skeletal remains with in vivo like nd contents at the ppb level intra bone and tooth ree analysis can be used to screen for appropriate areas large intra bone nd concentration gradients of 10 1 10 3 are often measured nd concentrations in the inner bone cortex increase over timescales of millions of years while bone rims may be enriched over millenial timescales nevertheless e nd values are often similar within one e nd unit within a single bone larger intra bone differences in specimens may either reflect a partial preservation of in vivo values or changing e nd values of the diagenetic fluid during fossilization however most fossil specimens and the outer rims of bones will record taphonomic 143 nd 144 nd incorporated post mortem during diagenesis unlike ree patterns 143 nd 144 nd are not biased by fractionation processes during ree uptake into the apatite crystal lattice hence the e nd value is an important tracer for taphonomy and reworking bones and teeth from autochthonous fossil assemblages have small variations of 1 e nd unit only in contrast fossil bones and teeth from over 20 different marine and terrestrial fossil sites have a total range of e nd values from 13 0 to 4 9 n 80 often matching the composition of the embedding sediment this implies that the surrounding sediment is the source of nd in the fossil bones and that the specimens of this study seem not to have been reworked differences in e nd values between skeletal remains and embedding sediment may either indicate reworking of fossils and or a ree uptake from a diagenetic fluid with non sediment derived e nd values the latter often applies to fossil shark teeth which may preserve paleo seawater values complementary to e nd values 87 sr 86 sr can help to further constrain the fossil provenance and reworking

the behavior of rare earth elements in seawater precise determination of variations in the north pacific water column abstract we present new highly precise and accurate data for ten rare earth elements rees in two water column profiles and in bottom waters from three additional localities in the north pacific our results presented here and in an earlier publication indicate that the water column in the western north pacific is stratified with respect to the isotopic composition of nd as well as nd la sm nd and er la both the nd isotopic and the ree data show that ree transport is strongly influenced by horizontal advection even in the sluggish circulation of the pacific in general rees increase in concentration with depth at mid latitude they reach a maximum concentration at about 3000 m and then decrease to the bottom at high latitude heavy rees reach a maximum concentration near 3000 m whereas light rees continue to increase in concentration with depth the deep water maximum and bottom water depletion is interpreted as an advective feature resulting from the flow of a lower concentration of rees in antarctic bottom water under a higher concentration of rees in the north pacific concentrations of rees do not show a linear relationship with those of si indicating that the ree cycle is not directly coupled to that of the si cycle ree element ratios i e nd la correlate with hydrographie properties which suggests that major features of the ree patterns may be conserved during lateral transport comparison of our ree data to those in previously published reports on pacific seawater shows that the identification of ree distributions affected by advection is only made possible by the high precision analysis we developed for this study the ce concentration we observe is relatively constant over 200 4500 m depth at both sites where we have complete profiles this unique constancy of ce is in contrast to the contiguous rees la and nd which show substantial concentration variations with depth

a strontium and oxygen isotope assessment of a possible fourth century immigrant population in a hampshire cemetery southern england the aim of the project was to test the hypothesis using oxygen and strontium isotopes that a group of burials in the late roman cemetery of lankhills winchester southern england were migrants from the danube region of central europe the method assumes that the oxygen isotope composition of immigrants from this locale would be significantly more depleted that any one british origin and that the restricted range in sr isotope compositions produced by chalk in the overlying biosphere of southern england would discriminate between the local population and settlers from elsewhere as a control for the immigrant group a sample of romano british individuals were examined to provide a comparative data set the results showed that the majority of the individuals used to define the local control group plotted in a restricted field of strontium and oxygen isotope composition that was consistent with the values expected for the hampshire area of southern england by contrast the exotic putatively immigrant population generated a much more dispersed field including four with 18o drinking water values of 10 or less which supports a non british origin for these individuals the study shows that the archaeological data suggesting that there is an exotic population buried at the lankhills cemetery is generally supported by the isotope work although the exotic group appears to a rather dispersed set of individuals rather than a single population from a restricted overseas location

18 o modelling of freshwater inputs in baffin bay and canadian arctic coastal waters 18o salinity modelling of marine environments has been proposed for various areas including some arctic seas the present report concerns arctic coastal waters collected along the west coast of greenland northern baffin bay the arctic archipelago and the north shore of alaska measurements of 18o versus salinity allow the identification of three main components marine standard water continental freshwater and sea ice meltwater continental waters may be represented by either glacial meltwater western greenland land drainage mackenzie areas or both quantitative determinations of the respective parts involved in mixed coastal waters imply a precise knowledge of the isotopic characteristics of the local continental waters these determinations may be achieved either numerically or graphically

isotope compositions c o sr nd of vertebrate fossils from the middle eocene oil shale of messel germany implications for their taphonomy and palaeoenvironment abstract the middle eocene oil shale deposits of messel are famous for their exceptionally well preserved articulated 47 myr old vertebrate fossils that often still display soft tissue preservation the isotopic compositions o c sr nd were analysed from skeletal remains of messel s terrestrial and aquatic vertebrates to determine the condition of geochemical preservation authigenic phosphate minerals and siderite were also analysed to characterise the isotope compositions of diagenetic phases in messel diagenetic end member values of the volcanically influenced and due to methanogenesis 12 c depleted anoxic bottom water of the meromictic eocene maar lake are isotopically very distinct from in vivo bioapatite values of terrestrial vertebrates this unique taphonomic setting allows the assessment of the geochemical preservation of the vertebrate fossils a combined multi isotope approach demonstrates that enamel of fossil vertebrates from messel is geochemically exceptionally well preserved and still contains near in vivo c o sr and possibly even nd isotope compositions while bone and dentine are diagenetically altered enamel of the hippomorph perissodactyl propalaeotherium has low 13 c values 9 0 7 typical for c 3 plant feeders dentine of the same teeth has 13 c values 15 17 higher amongst the highest 13 c bioapatite values reported for terrestrial vertebrates this reflects diagenetic carbonate exchange with the strongly 12 c depleted anoxic lake bottom water enamel 87 sr 86 sr values 0 711 0 001 are consistent with propalaeotherium feeding on palaeozoic bedrocks surrounding lake messel and suggests that the basaltic tuff ring around the maar was already eroded 640 ka after its formation dentine has however much lower volcanically influenced 87 sr 86 sr 0 706 due to diagenetic sr uptake from the lake water oil shale enamel 18 o p values 18 0 6 of propalaeotherium are 2 3 lower than those of bones and scales of aquatic vertebrates that lived in the 18 o enriched lake water using transfer functions a 18 o h 2 o value of 5 1 for meteoric water and a mat of 18 2 5 c were reconstructed for messel

spatial variation of biologically available strontium isotopes 87sr 86sr in an archipelagic setting a case study from the caribbean this paper presents the results of strontium sr isotope analysis of modern and archaeological animal remains and modern plant samples from the caribbean region the goal is to assess if patterns of human mobility can be determined from the archaeological record in an archipelagic setting the range of variability and spatial distribution of biologically available strontium isotope signatures is reported and data evaluated to determine if sufficient heterogeneity exists to permit the identification of mobility despite the presence of potentially large contributions of marine strontium in island and coastal ecosystems the is landscape is divided into several sub regions based on the age and lithology of underlying geology and the variability of

high resolution dating of deep sea clays using sr isotopes in fossil fish teeth abstract strontium isotopic compostitions of ichthyoliths microscopic fish remains in deep sea clays recovered from the north pacific ocean odp holes 885a 886b and 886c are used to provide stratigraphic age control within these otherwise undatable sediments age control within the deep sea clays is crucial for determining changes in sedimentation rates and for calculating fluxes of chemical and mineral components to the sediments the sr isotopic ages are in excellent agreement with independent age datums from above diatom ooze below basalt basement and within cretaceous tertiary boundary the clay deposit the 87 sr 86 sr ratios of fish teeth from the top of the pelagic clay unit 0 708989 indicate an late miocene age 5 8 ma as do radiolarian and diatom biostratigraphic ages in the overlying diatom ooze the 87 sr 86 sr ratio 0 707887 is consistent with a cretaceous tertiary boundary age as identified by anomalously high iridium shocked quartz and sperules in hole 886c the 87 sr 86 sr ratios of pretreated fish teeth from the base of the clay unit are similar to late cretaceous seawater 0 707779 0 707519 consistent with radiometric ages from the underlying basalt of 81 ma calculation of sedimentation rates based on sr isotopic ages from hole 886c indicate an average sedimentation rate of 17 7 m myr in unit ii diatom ooze 0 55 m myr in unit iiia pelagic clay and 0 68 m myr in unit iiib distal hydrothermal precipitates the sr isotopic ages indicate a period of greatly reduced sedimentation or possible hiatus between about 35 and 65 ma eocene paleocene with a linear sedimentation rate of only 0 04 m myr the calculated sedimentation rates are generally inversely proportional to cobalt accumulation rates and ichthyolith abundances however discrepancies between sr isotope ages and cobalt accumulation ages of 10 15 myr are evident particularly in the middle of the clay unit iiia oligocene paleocene

holocene climate variability in europe evidence from δ18o textural and extension rate variations in three speleothems time series o isotope profiles for three u th dated stalagmites have revealed that for much of the holocene a site on the atlantic seaboard sw ireland exhibits first order 18o trends that are almost exactly out of phase with coupled 18o curves from two southern european sites se france and nw italy in the irish stalagmite cc3 from crag cave sw ireland low 18o at 10 000 cal yr bp reflects cool conditions by the early to mid holocene 9000 6000 cal yr bp 18o had increased reflecting the onset of warmer conditions on the atlantic seaboard this shift to higher 18o was accompanied by a marked increase in the stalagmite extension rate reinforcing our interpretation that this was a period of relative warmth except for an episode of increased extension rate about 5500 yr ago 18o in the crag stalagmite exhibits a gradual decrease accompanied by declining extension rates between 7800 and 3500 cal yr bp interpreted as a cooling trend there is evidence for increases in both 18o and stalagmite extension rate in the period from 3500 cal yr bp to the present day suggesting a return to warmer conditions on the atlantic seaboard in the stalagmite from nw italy er76 grotta di ernesto trentino province the early holocene c 9200 7800 cal yr bp is characterised by high 18o probably indicative of warm and or dry conditions exceptionally low 18o from 7800 to 6900 cal yr bp at this site reflects a well defined wet phase cerin wet phase in the last three millennia this stalagmite exhibits a shift to lower 18o interpreted as some combination of cooler and or wetter conditions unlike the irish stalagmite the italian sample does not show a correlation between 18o and extension rate instead its extension rate correlates roughly with 13c presumably reflecting a climate driven vegetation change in the early holocene 18o in the french stalagmite cl26 grotte de clamouse herault province se france was low relative to its holocene average for much of the period since c 3500 cal yr bp this stalagmite exhibits higher 18o than in the early holocene suggesting warmer conditions like the irish stalagmite the french sample exhibits a well defined correlation between 18o and extension rate had drip water availability been the dominant control on 18o at this semi arid site then higher 18o would have been accompanied by lower not higher extension rates this suggests strongly that temperature rather than rainfall amount was the dominant control at this site while conclusions regarding the patterns of climate variability on a continent scale must remain tentative because of the limited number of stalagmites studied we argue that early holocene warm conditions on the atlantic seaboard irish site coincided with relatively cool conditions at the clamouse site by c 3500 yr ago the pattern appears to have been reversed

subglacial sediment dispersal and till composition dispersal of subglacial sediment down ice from its bedrock source assumes the form of a negative exponential decay curve dispersal decay curves can be quantified by their decay constants half distances half lives and total transport distances mapped dispersal decay curves associated with pleistocene ice sheets in north america and europe identify several scales of dispersal ranging from local kilometers to continental 100 s to 1000 s km scales till composition reflects the various scales of dispersal local scales short transport distances result in tills that reflect underlying bedrock whereas continental scales long transport distances result in tills derived largely from sources far up ice a number of parameters proposed as influencing subglacial sediment dispersal and transport distances do not explain the range of scales observed although they may explain minor variations kilometers in transport distances topography and basal ice velocity sliding velocity are interpreted as

the last domicile of the iceman from hauslabjoch a geochemical approach using sr c and o isotopes and trace element signatures abstract we present sr c and o isotope ratios and quantitative ratios of trace element ratios in the rib and the femur of the tyrolean iceman otzi the results from the rib and the femur are compared with those obtained from pre industrial historic human skull bone fragments collected in the late 19th century from charnel houses located on different geological backgrounds throughout north and south tyrol comparison of strontium isotope data from the bone fragments locates the iceman s domicile during the last 5 to 10 years of his life to the crystalline part of the central alps statistical analysis of the trace element ratios together with oxygen isotope results suggests that the iceman probably spent most of his last years in southern elevated part of the otztal however the results from iceman only represent those from a single individual and are not a representative average of a group it cannot therefore be established with absolute certainty that the original trace element signatures were conserved especially during the first stage of mummification our conclusions should therefore be regarded as tentative but nevertheless the best possible indication his domicile and a stimulus for further research

resolving archaeological populations with sr isotope mixing models strontium isotope analysis of tooth enamel is a useful provenancing technique to investigate the childhood origins and residential mobility of ancient people however where different geographical target regions have similar biosphere 87sr 86sr it is often difficult to resolve the 87sr 86sr ranges of two different groups of people and establish what constitutes the local range at each site here a multi period study is presented from the outer hebrides scotland and an investigation of neolithic and early bronze age populations from the yorkshire wolds ne england the aim is to demonstrate that despite complex human dietary strategies simple mixing systems with only two end members do occur in archaeological human populations in certain geological provinces and despite overlapping 87sr 86sr ranges it is possible to separate two populations based on the structure within the data set

maize mounds and the movement of people isotope analysis of a mississippian fort ancient region abstract the development of farming traditions has long interested archaeologists worldwide the relationship between this process and human movement has become increasingly well defined in recent years here we examine this issue in a case study concerning the longstanding question of the spread of maize agriculture and mississippian cultural traditions throughout much of the eastern u s although it has long been common to interpret the spread of mississippian maize agriculture partially as a result of human migration there have been very few direct studies of the question we do so here by analyzing human tooth enamel from burials for 87sr 86sr and 13c our results suggest that fort ancient societies adopted maize agriculture quickly with high levels of consumption at early sites the intensity of maize consumption declined over time however in contrast to the current model there is evidence for the presence of non local individuals at early fort ancient sites particularly turpin with the majority likely attributable to neighboring mississippian regions these developments occurred at some of the larger fort ancient sites by the mouths of the great and little miami rivers in ohio where the most abundant evidence for mississippian house styles and objects is concentrated

strontium isotope stratigraphy of enewetak atoll sup 87 sr sup 86 sr ratios determined for samples from a 350 m core of neogene lagoonal shallow water limestones from enewetak atoll display a remarkably informative trend like the recently published data for deep sea drilling project dsdp carbonates sup 87 sr sup 86 sr at enewetak increases monotonically but not smoothly from the early miocene to the pleistocene the data show intervals of little or no change in sup 87 sr sup 86 sr punctuated by sharp transitions to lower values toward greater core depths the sharp transitions correlate with observed solution disconformities caused by periods of subaerial erosion whereas the intervals of little or no change in sup 87 sr sup 86 sr correspond to intervals of rapid accumulation of shallow water carbonate sediments when converted to numerical ages using the published dsdp 590b trend the best resolved time breaks are at 282 m 12 3 to 18 2 ma missing and 121 6 m 3 0 to 5 3 ma missing below the lagoon floor at enewetak sr isotopes offer a stratigraphic resolution for these shallow marine neogene carbonates comparable to that of nannofossil zonation in deep sea carbonates 0 3 3 m y in addition the correlation of times of sr isotope breaks at enewetak with times of rapid sr isotope change in the dsdp 590b samples confirms the importance ofmore sea level changes in the evolution of global marine sr isotopes and shows that the sr isotope response to sea level falls is rapid less

isotope domain mapping of 87sr 86sr biosphere variation on the isle of skye scotland abstract the potential of 87 sr 86 sr isotope composition for tracking and determining the origin of material whether it is humans animals water or wine can be fully realized only if high quality reference datasets are available against which to compare the unknowns this is currently not the case despite the rapid increase in 87 sr 86 sr based provenance studies of biosphere materials there are no well documented maps available most researchers resort to generating reference maps from a variety of geological datasets plus the analysis of sparse environmental9 samples a major reason for this lack of reference material is the investment needed to undertake systematic sampling and analysis over large areas a further problem is associated with the choice of proxy material as organisms differ in their habitat and exploitation of resources in this paper various approaches to isotope biosphere sampling are considered some of the problems are assessed the precision required for the study of human populations is discussed and a first attempt is made to condense all of the available information into an isotope package9 map the work is based on a study undertaken on the isle of skye in the inner hebrides and reduces the complexity of geological and isotope data into five main 87 sr 86 sr packages package 1 northern area 0 705 0 7092 package 2 ne coast 0 7082 0 7102 package 3 granitic rocks 0 716 0 720 package 4 metamorphic rocks 0 7092 0 7188 package 5 seawater 0 7092 0 005 2 the approach of trying to constrain the isotope composition of certain areas and or lithologies offers the possibility of extrapolating to other similar areas without having to sample at the original density

isotopic composition of recent shark teeth as a proxy for environmental conditions abstract the o c and sr isotope compositions of teeth from ten species belonging to five families and three orders of sharks were measured to determine the influence of habitat diet and possible species specific fractionation effects on the isotopic composition of biogenic phosphate from fish the sharks were recently caught in subtropical waters off the kwazulu natal kzn coast of south africa as well as from cold waters in prince william sound pws alaska and victor bay vb nunavut canada 18 o values of tooth phosphate 18 o p range from 20 9 to 23 5 for the kzn sharks for most species the range in measured 18 o p values is about 0 6 but it may be as high as 1 1 for different teeth from a single shark dentine and enameloid within individual teeth have no apparent differences in 18 o p values the 18 o p values of the kzn shark teeth reflect the typical habitat of the studied species primarily the thermal structure of the water column off kzn at depths between 20 and 280 m the 18 o p values of teeth from different greenland sharks from vb and pacific sleeper sharks from pws are very homogeneous averaging 25 8 and 24 7 respectively these values appear to be in equilibrium with deep 500 m ocean waters in each case at temperatures of about 0 3 c or less there is little discernable evidence for species specific fractionation effects for the oxygen isotope composition of phosphate in the studied marine fish the oxygen isotope composition of carbonate in apatite averages about 9 1 higher than corresponding 18 o p values in agreement with equilibrium fractionation between carbonate and phosphate but with a large variance 1 1 5 18 o c values also vary by up to 1 between enameloid and dentine within single teeth but in a non systematic way differences in 13 c values between carbonate in enameloid and dentine is also large up to 8 but the 13 c values vary systematically enameloid is always enriched in 13 c compared to dentine and the 13 c content increases with developmental stage of the teeth 13 c values measured for enameloid 1 6 to 4 8 appear to approach equilibrium with dissolved inorganic carbon in seawater in contrast 13 c values for dentine range from 6 4 to 2 3 for kzn sharks and 9 0 to 10 8 for the cold water sleeper sharks and are compatible with a predominantly dietary carbon source the 87 sr 86 sr ratios of teeth from kzn sharks as well as those from pws and vb are uniform averaging 0 709167 sr content varies from 1270 to 2100 ppm a range that is similar to that in well preserved fossilized teeth seawater sr is thus clearly incorporated in vivo concentrations of sm and nd are in the ppb range and contrast the ppm range in fossilized teeth indicating a postmortem incorporation of rare earth elements in apatite of the teeth

variations in atmospheric sulphate recorded in stalagmites by synchrotron micro xrf and xanes analyses abstract we report here the first speleothem time series of the variability of sulphate a species whose abundance in catchments is strongly influenced by atmospheric anthropogenic and volcanic sources annually resolved archives of s mg si and p were generated by applying synchrotron radiation micro x ray fluorescence xrf to two speleothems from different sites in northern italy x ray absorption edge spectrometry proves that the s is in the form of sulphate and xrf mapping demonstrates that s is within calcite and enriched zones are predominantly as layers a post 1850 a d record from the ernesto cave shows a substantial rise in sulphate interpreted as reflecting the largely anthropogenically forced variation of sulphate of the atmospheric boundary layer moderated by some ecosystem storage analysis of the circa 5 2 to circa 5 0 ka interval of a speleothem from savi cave where ecosystem retention of s is likely to have been minimal shows a spiky sulphate record resembling that of ice cores a series of sulphate peaks suggest that multiple volcanic sulphate aerosol emissions at that time this probably enhanced summer temperature cooling thus favouring the preservation of the human mummy of neolithic copper age the iceman on the watershed between italy and austria both examples illustrate the power of speleothems to record atmospheric sulphate variability

87sr 86sr na f sr and la in skeletal fish debris as a measure of the paleosalinity of fossil fish habitats forty six samples of apatite from lower vertebrates ostracoderms placoderms elasmobranchs actinopterygians and crossopterygians ranging in age from silurian to recent were analyzed to determine each specimen9s 87 sr 86 sr isotopic ratio and content of the elements na f sr and la our aim was to determine whether these chemical parameters can yield reliable information about the paleosalinity conditions of the ancient fish habitats in recent times the uniform 87 sr 86 sr isotopic ratio and na f and sr abundances of sea water in general differ characteristically from the corresponding ratios and abundances of fresh waters and low saline brackish waters for evaluation of the data on fossils analyses were made on recent skeletal fish apatite derived from different waters with known sr isotopic ratio and salinity salinity interpretations based on our chemical analyses are generally congruent with the salinity conditions indicated by other paleoenvironmental parameters inherent in the fossil bearing strata some fossil specimens however gave signals seemingly incompatible with prevailing opinions regarding the environment in which the embedding strata formed in some cases the divergences could be accounted for by erratic occurrences of reworked material other cases such as ostracoderm and placoderm remains from the old red sandstone are less easy to unravel the method tested in this study may be a useful tool clarifying for example salinity conditions during formation of various old red sandstone deposits

organic carbon accumulation and metabolic pathways in sediments of mangrove forests in southern thailand abstract rates of organic carbon accumulation mineralization and burial in sediments were examined during dry and wet seasons in four mangrove forests of a shallow water embayment ao sawi in southern thailand mass sediment accumulation mar estimated from 210pb and 137cs profiles was rapid at all forests ranging from 2 9 to 7 6 kg m 2 yr 1 mixed layer sediment thicknesses ranged from 16 to 38 cm total inputs of organic carbon ranged from 26 4 to 40 9 mol c m 2 yr 1 and burial rates ranged from 15 3 to 23 4 mol c m 2 yr 1 total rates of carbon mineralization estimated from direct measurements of co2 gas flux from exposed sediments from dic flux from submerged sediments and from core incubations for co2 ranged from 7 0 to 16 4 mol c m 2 yr 1 with few consistent seasonal differences among the four forests rates of o2 gas flux into exposed sediments ranged from 9 4 to 91 4 mmol o2 m 2 d 1 and were significantly greater than rates of dissolved o2 flux into submerged sediments range 21 9 38 3 mmol o2 m 2 d 1 oxic respiration was the largest decomposition pathway with sulfate reduction range 0 6 16 9 mmol s m 2 d 1 the next most important pathway other metabolic pathways appeared to be minor and methane was not detected in the porewater or in the gas flux chambers the discrepancy between rates of o2 and co2 fluxes implies involvement in geochemical processes e g sulfide oxidation authigenic mineral formation sediment budgets indicate that organic carbon preservation was greatest 71 burial efficiency in the oldest forest with equivalent burial efficiency 57 59 in the younger forests mineralization efficiency ranged from 27 40 with the lowest efficiency at the oldest forest these tropical mangrove forests are storage sites for sediment and on average retain approximately 60 of total input of organic carbon to the sediment

holocene climate fire and vegetation dynamics at the tree line in the northwestern swiss alps treelines are expected to rise to higher elevations with climate warming the rate and extent however are still largely unknown here we present the first multi proxy palaeoecological study from the treeline in the northwestern swiss alps that covers the entire holocene we reconstructed climate fire and vegetation dynamics at iffigsee an alpine lake at 2 065 m a s l by using seismic sedimentary surveys loss on ignition visible spectrum reflectance spectroscopy pollen spore macrofossil and charcoal analyses afforestation with larix decidua and tree betula probably b pendula started at 9 800 cal b p more than 1 000 years later than at similar elevations in the central and southern alps indicating cooler temperatures and or a high seasonality highest biomass production and forest position of 2 100 2 300 m a s l are inferred during the holocene thermal maximum from 7 000 to 5 000 cal b p with the onset of pastoralism and transhumance at 6 800 6 500 cal b p human impact became an important factor in the vegetation dynamics at iffigsee this early evidence of pastoralism is documented by the presence of grazing indicators pollen spores as well as a wealth of archaeological finds at the nearby mountain pass of schnidejoch human and fire impact during the neolithic and bronze ages led to the establishment of pastures and facilitated the expansion of picea abies and alnus viridis we expect that in mountain areas with land abandonment the treeline will react quickly to future climate warming by shifting to higher elevations causing drastic changes in species distribution and composition as well as severe biodiversity losses

tracing population mobility in the aegean using isotope geochemistry a first map of local biologically available 87sr 86sr signatures abstract strontium isotope ratio 87sr 86sr analysis of archaeological human skeletal remains is an efficient method of investigating past population movement and residential mobility by determining probable geographical origins for the individuals examined for this to be achieved however a map of biologically available 87sr 86sr signatures across the region investigated is needed this paper presents a first such map for the aegean based on 87sr 86sr values recovered mainly from archaeological animal dental enamel and modern snail shells from sites largely distributed in the southern part of this region although not exhaustive this comprehensive dataset of local biologically available 87sr 86sr signatures shows a marked difference between mainland sites of the pindos and parnassos zones and the islands of south eastern aegean crossed by the sub pelagonian zone 0 70808 0 70869 and sites in the central cyclades and the north eastern aegean islands falling into the attic cycladic metamorphic belt and the vardar zone respectively 0 70926 0 71187 biologically available 87sr 86sr values from sites on central euboea in the pelagonian zone south eastern attica and the western cyclades in the attic cycladic metamorphic belt and on crete in the gavrovo zone are also relatively high 0 70853 0 70931 but lower than those recorded for the central cyclades and the north eastern aegean

water mass exchange and variations in seawater temperature in the nw tethys during the early jurassic evidence from neodymium and oxygen isotopes of fish teeth and belemnites article i nfo oxygen and neodymium isotope analyses performed on biostratigraphically well dated fish remains recovered from the hettangian to toarcian of the paris basin were used to reconstruct variations of early jurassic seawater temperature and to track oceanographic changes in the nw tethys our results indicate a strong correlation between 18 o trends recorded by fish remains and belemnites confirming the paleoenvironmental origin of oxygen isotope variations interestingly temperatures recorded by pelagic fishes and nektobenthic belemnites and bottom dwelling fishes are comparable during the late pliensbachian sea level lowstand but gradually differ during the early toarcian transgressive episode recording a difference in water temperatures of 6 c during the bifrons zone this could suggest that the surface bottom water temperature difference was not large enough during regressive phases to be recorded by organisms living near the lower and upper part of the water column the globally unradiogenic nd budget of euro boreal waters through the early jurassic suggests that these waters were strongly affected by continental neodymium input from surrounding emerged areas and that exchange with more radiogenic waters from the tethys and panthalassa oceans remained limited this supports the existence of a southward directed current in the euro boreal area for most of the early jurassic the only exception is observed at the early late pliensbachian transition where a positive end excursion is recorded suggesting northward influx of low latitude tethyan or panthalassan waters which may have contributed to the warming of nw tethyan seawater recorded at this time the absence of a marked negative excursion in end concomitant with a negative 18 o shift recorded during the falciferum zone exaratum subzone argues against the influence of less radiogenic arctic water influxes with low 18 o values during this interval instead we suggest that

global climate perturbations during the permo triassic mass extinctions recorded by continental tetrapods from south africa several studies of the marine sedimentary record have documented the evolution of global climate during the permo triassic mass extinction by contrast the continental records have been less exploited due to the scarcity of continuous sections from the latest permian into the early triassic the south african karoo basin exposes one of the most continuous geological successions of this time interval thus offering the possibility to reconstruct climate variations in southern laurasia from the middle permian to middle triassic interval both air temperature and humidity variations were estimated using stable oxygen 18op and carbon 13cc isotope compositions of vertebrate apatite significant fluctuations in both 18op and 13cc values mimic those of marine records and suggest that stable isotope compositions recorded in vertebrate apatite reflect global climate evolution in terms of air temperature oxygen isotopes show an abrupt increase of about 8 c toward the end of the wuchiapingian this occurred during a slight cooling trend from the capitanian to the permo triassic boundary ptb at the end of the permian an intense and fast warming of 16 c occurred and kept increasing during the olenekian these thermal fluctuations may be related to the emeishan south china and siberian volcanic paroxysms that took place at the end of the capitanian and at the end of the permian respectively vertebrate apatite 13cc partly reflects the important fluctuations of the atmospheric 13c values the differences with marine curves being likely due to the evolution of local humidity both the oxygen and carbon isotope compositions indicate that the ptb was followed by a warm and arid phase that lasted 6 ma before temperatures decreased during the late anisian toward that of the end permian environmental fluctuations occurring around the ptb that affected both continental and marine realms with similar magnitude likely originated from volcanism and methane release

fish tooth δ18o revising late cretaceous meridional upper ocean water temperature gradients the oxygen isotope composition of fossil fi sh teeth a paleo upper ocean temperature proxy exceptionally resistant to diagenetic alteration provides new insight on the evolution of the low to middlelatitude thermal gradient between the middle cretaceous climatic optimum and the cooler latest cretaceous period the new middle cretaceous low to middle latitude thermal gradient agrees with that previously inferred from planktonic foraminifera 18o recovered from deep sea drilling project and ocean drilling program drilling sites although the isotopic temperatures derived from 18o of fish teeth are uniformly higher by 3 4 c in contrast our new latest cretaceous thermal gradient is markedly steeper than those previously published for this period fish tooth 18o data demonstrate that low to middle latitude thermal gradients of the middle cretaceous climatic optimum and of the cooler latest cretaceous are similar to the modern one despite a cooling of 7 c between the two periods our new results imply that no drastic changes in meridional heat transport are required to explain the late cretaceous climate based on climate models such a cooling without any change in the low to middle latitude thermal gradient supports an atmospheric co2 decrease as the primary driver of the climatic evolution recorded during the late cretaceous

defining local signature in terms of sr isotope composition using a tenth to twelfth century anglo saxon population living on a jurassic clay carbonate terrain rutland uk abstract the sr isotope ratios mad sr concentration in tooth enamel from a rural tenth twelfth century anglo saxon population living on a jurassic clay carbonate terrain in eastern england gives the following mean values 87sr 86sr 0 709820 0018 2o n 22 and sr concentrations 74 62 p p m 2o the isotope data are taken to be representative of anglo saxon biosphere values in the area of study the sr isotope composition of soil leachates plant material riverwaters and animal tooth enamel associated with the burial site were all analysed to see which gave the best approximation to these local anglo saxon values the aim being to define the best method of predict ing the local sr signature of areas for archaeological purposes the sr isotope composition of acetic acid soil leachates were dominated by the carbonate soil component and gave 0 7085 2 0 0020 water leachates gave 0 7090 0 0014 and plant material gave 0 7092 0 0018 all at 2o n 12 all of these materials were less radiogenic that those of the anglo saxon population riverwater gave the same result as the plants at 0 7092 2 0 00 2 2o n 3 the anglo saxon animal tooth enamel gave the best match with a value of 0 7099 0 0017 2o n 13 analysis of variance anova tests show that there is a high probability 70 probability 2sd that the animals and the humans sampled were from the same population with respect to sr isotope composition thus animal tooth enamel proved to be the best proxy in this study for the local human population many archaeological studies use skeletal sr isotope characteristics in an attempt to determine whether a group of people comprise a single population whether there is an exotic component in the group or whether or not the entire group come from outside the area in question price

insights into immigration and social class at machu picchu peru based on oxygen strontium and lead isotopic analysis abstract the inca empire ad 1438 1532 made common practice of relocating individuals households and entire communities throughout their expansive realm for different reasons depending on subjects assigned social class reconstructing patterns of immigration at inca period sites could therefore permit some estimation of the social class es among their constituents and thereby provide insights into the functional dynamics of inca political economy however this is a difficult endeavor using only archaeological lines of evidence this study presents oxygen strontium and lead isotopic results from the well preserved well contextualized skeletal population n 74 from the inca site of machu picchu peru isotopic data are used to reconstruct patterns of immigration at the site which are in turn used to directly estimate the social class of the population the resulting isotopic data are widely distributed with no apparent modality matching the expected distribution of a particular class of nonelite retainers a novel application of multivariate statistics coupled with geological and faunal isotopic reference data also permits tentative estimation of individuals regions of origin this study provides empirical and analytical frameworks for future research in reconstructing residential movement and class dynamics in the late prehistoric andes

oxygen isotope analyses of co existing carbonate and phosphate in biogenic apatite a way to monitor diagenetic alteration of bone phosphate abstract the oxygen isotopic composition of phosphate 18 op and structural carbonate 18 oc of hydroxylapatite was determined in 31 bone and tooth samples of modern mammals from different countries these two variables are highly correlate r 2 0 98 and the calculated best fit of linear regression is very similar to the equation calculated from the phosphate and carbonate palaeotemperature equations 1 2 according to previous measurements 3 6 on fossils of different ages from different areas it seems quite improbable to find isotopically altered skeletal remains showing a good correlation between 18 op and 18 oc as is the case with modern samples it therefore seems possible at least in some cases to use these measurements for monitoring fossil bone and tooth diagenetic alteration when a set of points lie on the equilibrium line or close to it the 18 o values could be considered close to the original values in contrast when the points lie to the left or to the right of this line this probably means that the values are diagenetically modified due to interaction with meteoric water or 18 o enriched water respectively

incremental growth and diagenesis of skeletal parts of the lamnoid shark otodus obliquus from the early eocene ypresian of morocco abstract in contrast to ubiquitous extinct shark teeth elasmobranch skeletons are composed principally of cartilage a vertebrate tissue that rarely preserves in the fossil record in a notable exception shark vertebral centra are secondarily ossified during ontogeny and therefore more prone to fossilization when they are found in conjunction with taxonomically diagnostic teeth these centra preserve a record of incremental growth that potentially can be used for macroevolutionary and ontogenetic studies consisting of bone hydroxyapatite mineral phase however fossilized centra are prone to diagenesis the extent of diagenesis is reported here for associated vertebral centra of the extinct lamnoid shark otodus obliquus from the early eocene ypresian of morocco using gross x radiographic and ft ir techniques these centra demonstrate significant diagenesis with the existing secondary mineral consisting of francolite carbonate fluorapatite nevertheless the physical incremental growth bands consisting of alternating dark light couplets are preserved in the centra carbonate 18 o values across the growth axis of three centra indicate that a proxy signal is archived and interpreted to represent winter summer seasonal growth for each dark light couplet band given these results the 19 physical growth bands counted for each of three centra of the same individual represent annuli i e annular growth couplets and represents a maximum age for this individual when it died despite claims to the contrary pervasive in the literature once diagenesis is understood then oxygen isotope analyses of bone carbonate provide important data that can be used to interpret the paleobiology of incremental growth in fossilized vertebrate skeletal tissues nevertheless because diagenesis is present and probably pervasive in fossilized bone all such incremental studies should use both physical e g x radiographic and ft ir and stable isotopic techniques in order to better understand the paleobiology of extinct vertebrates

migration and viking dublin paleomobility and paleodiet through isotopic analyses abstract during the early medieval period in ireland dublin was established as the largest viking settlement on the island in the ninth century ad a previous biodistance study has suggested that the population of the town consisted of a polyethnic amalgam of immigrant and indigenous in this study we use biogeochemistry to investigate paleomobility and paleodiet in archeological human remains from the ninth to eleventh century levels at the sites at fishamble street ii national museum of ireland excavation number e172 fishamble street iii e190 and john s lane e173 as well as twelfth century remains from wood quay e132 through radiogenic strontium isotope stable oxygen carbon and nitrogen isotope and elemental concentration analyses we investigate the origins of the individuals who lived and died in early and late viking dublin mean archaeological human enamel and bone isotope values from dublin are 87 sr 86 sr 0 70975 0 00139 2 n 22 13 c carbonate v pdb 14 8 0 8 1 n 12 and 18 o carbonate v pdb 7 2 1 0 1 n 12 archaeological human bone samples exhibit mean 13 c collagen v pdb 20 8 0 5 1 n 12 and mean 15 n collagen air 10 0 1 7 1 n 12 comparing these data with archaeological faunal data from dublin and published data from northern europe we argue that there are no clear immigrants from other parts of the north atlantic although there is one clear outlier in both origins and diet overall the relative homogeneity in both paleomobility and paleodiet may support models of acculturation in viking dublin rather than a high number of first generation immigrants or continued migration from scandinavia

stable oxygen δ18o and hydrogen δd isotopes in ovicaprid dentinal collagen record seasonal variation abstract understanding paleoenvironmental conditions including the frequency and amplitude of seasonal variation is crucial to understanding a wide array of human behaviors in prehistory in vertebrate calcified tissue inorganic oxygen isotopes derived from apatite have been widely used as a proxy for paleoenvironment and seasonality in the archaeological record however organic sources of 18 o and d in mineralized tissue have remained largely unexplored here we measure the oxygen 18 o and hydrogen d composition of dentin collagen sequentially sampled from the lower cheek teeth of four modern ovicaprids from the baga gazar in chuluu bgc region of the gobi desert of mongolia a significant correlation between trends in hydrogen and oxygen isotope values within individual teeth was identified the amplitude of isotopic variation observed in sampled tooth dentin is similar to the yearly range of hydrogen and oxygen isotopic variation observed in meteoric precipitation for the region these data indicate that dentin collagen 18 o and d isotopic values reflect seasonal variation in the organic oxygen and hydrogen isotopic composition of diet and ingested water we argue that paired measurements of dentin collagen 18 o and d appear to be reliable seasonal climatic indicators

paleobiology and skeletochronology of jurassic dinosaurs implications from the histology and oxygen isotope compositions of bones fossil biogenic phosphate of fast growing primary bone tissue of dinosaurs can preserve a histologic and isotopic time series of annual seasonality in temperature variations similar to tooth enamel and other accretionary skeletal phases such as corals or wood on two bone fragments from sympatric dinosaurs with different histologic patterns of bone growth high resolution oxygen isotope profiles were analyzed along the radial direction of bone growth the investigated specimens are from the jurassic shishugou formation in the junggar basin nw china and have distinct patterns of compositional variation a fibrolamellar dinosaur bone with multiple lines of arrested growth lags and periodic growth cycles of decreasing bone laminae thickness displays a cyclic intra bone variation in 18o values of about 2 corresponding with the lags these growth cycles in fast growing fibrolamellar bone provide evidence for seasonal growth of dinosaurs in lower latitudes 45 n possibly influenced by a monsoon type paleoclimate seasonal changes in temperature and water supply are consistent with the oxygen isotope composition measured in dinosaur bone phosphate as well as with growth rings in contemporaneous fossil conifer wood from the same locality in contrast a plexiform sympatric sauropod bone displays continuous growth free of lags and has a lower intra bone variation of 0 8 differences in bone histology are also reflected in the oxygen isotopic composition and its intra bone variability indicating different physiological responses to external climatic stress between sympatric dinosaur species seasonal intra bone oxygen isotope variations combined with bone histology may thus yield new insights into species specific response to climatic stress and its influence on dinosaur growth formation of growth marks growth rates as well as dinosaur thermophysiology

freshwater fish δ18o indicates a messinian change of the precipitation regime in central africa tracking terrestrial environmental change throughout the neogene is a challenge notably in areas such as central africa where the few available data consist of a few vertebrate fossil assemblages here we aim to quantify the evolution of the 18 o of the main water body between four neogene wet episodes in the chad basin ranging from the late miocene to the early pliocene the 18 o of the open water body was inferred from oxygen isotope measurements of phosphate in the apatite of open water fish tooth enamel the more open the fish habitat the lower the 18 o as revealed by the teeth of the large tiger fish hydrocynus sampled in the four available chadian vertebrate fossiliferous areas i e toros menalla anthracotherid unit kossom bougoudi kolle and koro toro all located in the djurab desert chad and dated at 7 04 0 18 ma 5 26 0 23 ma 3 96 0 48 ma and 3 58 0 27 ma respectively the 18 o values increased by 2 between the two sites having ages that bracket the messinian time period and there was a slight increase of 0 6 difference between the three pliocene sites these results reflect unambiguously change in the water cycle in central africa during the late neogene interpreted as a constant drying trend between the four successive wet episodes registered in the djurab and a shift during the messinian

oxygen isotope variations in phosphate of biogenic apatites i fish bone apatite rechecking the rules of the game abstract the major advantage of the oxygen in phosphate isotope paleothermometry is that it is a system which records temperatures with great sensitivity while bone and teeth building organisms are alive and the record is nearly perfectly preserved after death fish from seven water bodies of different temperatures 3 23 c and different 18 o values 16 to 3 of the water were analysed the 18 o values of the analysed po 4 vary from 6 to 25 the system passed the following tests a the temperatures deduced from isotopic analyses of the sequence of fish from lake baikal are in good agreement with the temperatures measured in the thermally stratified lake b the isotopic composition of fish bone phosphate is not influenced by the isotopic composition of the phosphate which is fed to the fish but only by temperature and water composition isotopic analysis of fossil fish in combination with analysis of mammal bones should be a useful tool in deciphering continental paleoclimates

strontium isotope stratigraphy potential resolution and event correlation abstract a new generation 87sr 86sr isotope curve for the phanerozoic seawater based on a compilation of 3635 stratigraphically well defined and well preserved skeletal components results in a substantially narrower band with some discrepancies if compared to the curve of burke et al 1982 which is based mostly on whole rock samples the results obtained from low mg calcite shells foraminifers belemnites brachiopods and oysters are mostly superior to those from phosphatic skeletal components such as conodonts even if the latter are exceptionally well preserved cai 1 5 at this stage the phanerozoic data set based on fossils is patchy for the cambrian upper ordovician lower devonian and upper carboniferous triassic intervals the major practical constraint that precludes delineation of an unequivocal sr isotope curve for the phanerozoic seawater is the uncertainty in the assignment of absolute ages to the samples as a result the curve is in reality a band this is a reflection of the limitations of biostratigraphy and geochronology that are inherited by any derivative correlation and dating technique including isotope stratigraphy it is therefore unlikely that in the near future the sr isotope stratigraphy will surpass the resolution capability of biostratigraphy as a global correlation tool on the other hand if complemented by lithostratigraphy it is potentially a valuable tool for correlation of sequences on intrabasinal and regional scales taking into account the above limitations careful consideration must be given to assignment of higher order isotope peaks to specific events within a biozone and to the use of such events as a global correlation tool

stable carbon and oxygen isotope analysis of fossil tooth enamel using laser ablation abstract a technique is described whereby the 13c and 18o values of fossil tooth enamel can be measured in situ using laser ablation techniques the laser heats the sample and forms co2 from structural carbonate apatite the 18o values obtained with this method are equal to those of the phosphate oxygen due to the high temperature of reaction during ablation analytical precision is approximately 0 5 for both 13c and 18o the spatial resolution is 200 m or less which may be reduced as the technical modifications are made this method allows the analysis of samples that previously could not be analyzed due to difficulty with sample preparation size or rare nature the apparent oxygen isotope fractionation between the carbonate and laser derived oxygen co3 laser is 1 0071 for biogenic apatite at 38 c determined using the in situ laser comparison of 18o co3 and 18o laser analyses with 18o laser and 18o po4 results suggest a fractionation factor co3 po4 of 1 0083 variations in the 18o and 13c values of single teeth can be easily determined with the in situ technique this will allow the study of changes in diets or water sources during the period of tooth growth which for larger mammals can be several years for the tooth row the 13c and 18o values are important in paleodiet and paleoecology studies they can be used to study resource partitioning within an ecosystem and can shed light on the life history strategies within living and extinct species

oxygen isotope compositions of phosphate from middle miocene early pliocene marine vertebrates of peru phosphatic remains of marine vertebrates recovered from five fossil sites of the pisco formation ranging from the latest middle earliest late miocene ca 11 13 ma to the early pliocene ca 3 5 ma have been analysed for their oxygen isotope compositions 18op coexisting seals dolphins whales penguins and sharks from each locality have distinct 18op values reflecting ecology and physiology differences ranging from 18 2 to 21 4 for marine mammals from 19 5 to 21 5 for marine birds and from 20 9 to 23 1 for sharks systematic offsets observed between dolphin teeth and bones as well as between dolphin and whale bones indicate that the fractionation equation established by using data from extant cetaceans may not be directly applicable to miocene cetaceans in order to estimate water 18ow values assuming that polar ice caps were not totally developed during this time interval marine palaeotemperatures ranging from 13 0 1 3 c to 17 2 1 3 c were estimated comparison of our results with those obtained in other world s areas suggests that the oxygen isotope ratios of pisco vertebrates reflect the influence of both global and local events such as the setting of the atacama desert the cold humboldt current or the global phases of ice cap growth and decay

isotope paleontology growth and composition of extant calcareous species abstract isotope paleontology uses the isotopic composition of fossil remains of organisms to make inferences about the physical surroundings of growth of the organisms especially temperature and to obtain clues about life history and modes of growth in calcareous fossils oxygen isotopes are mainly used in the former and carbon isotopes in the latter however since physical surroundings and organism response are intimately associated both types of information are contained in each of the isotopic signals to explore the potential of isotope paleontology and to provide a basis for reconstruction a broad range of extant organisms has been studied taking the pioneering work of epstein and associates as a starting point results are summarized for a representative sampling of these studies with emphasis on work at the laboratories of the authors from the mid seventies to the present the organisms considered are nannoplankton benthic algae planktonic and benthic deep sea foraminifera larger foraminifera sponges corals bryozoans polychaetes arthropods bivalves gastropods cephalopods and vertebrates fish otoliths the survey broadly suggests that regarding oxygen isotopes materials tend to be precipitated close to equilibrium with the surrounding seawater as postulated by urey and that for carbon isotopes disequilibrium is the rule life spans growth rates differential seasonal growth and age of reproductive activity can be extracted under favorable circumstances from individual shells and skeletal parts in detail the interpretation of isotope records of individual shells is quite complicated and simple models will fail to give satisfactory results in many or most cases

the origin of the juch uypampa cave mummies strontium isotope analysis of archaeological human remains from bolivia previous analyses of strontium isotopes from human bone and teeth have identified diverse patterns of residential mobility in the south central andes during the middle horizon ad 500e1100 during this time the large polity of tiwanaku exerted great influence over what are now southern peru northern chile northwestern argentina and bolivia recently five naturallymummified individuals were discovered in the cave of juch uypampa in the pulacayo region of southern bolivia although these individuals were buried with a number of fine tiwanaku style grave goods as well as non tiwanaku items the burial site is isolated and does not conform to the pattern of large tiwanaku affiliated cemeteries and residential sites outside of the lake titicaca basin strontium isotope analysis was performed on enamel from two adult men and bone from a third adult male in order to test the hypotheses that one or more of the males was from either the tiwanaku heartland in the lake titicaca basin the chilean oasis of san pedro de atacama which contains a series of cemeteries with tiwanaku style grave goods or the local area in which they were buried results show that two individuals likely spent their childhood in the local area where they were interred while the third man probably spent at least the last twenty years of his life in that region before being buried there this raises interesting questions regarding the nature of tiwanaku influence in southern bolivia and the relationship between the juch uypampa mummies and the tiwanaku polity 2005 elsevier ltd all rights reserved

seawater sr isotope variation over the past 300 kyr and influence of global climate cycles the past 300 000 years have been characterized by glacial inter glacial fluctuations accompanied by glacio eustatic changes in sea level and changes in continental erosion arising from varying low latitude rainfall and river drainage here we use measurements of strontium isotopes in foraminifera and corals to place limits on variations in the sr isotope composition of sea water in response to these changing inputs we find small variations of about 20 p p m in the 87sr 86sr ratio which for the foraminiferal record seem to follow a cycle close to the 100 kyr periodicity seen for a number of other climate related phenomena these are superimposed on a general increase in87sr 86sr through the cenozoic to the present on short timescales these changes are likely to be controlled by variations in the global riverine sr flux and thus by weathering rates rather than in the hydrothermal sr flux at mid ocean ridges we show that transient variations over a 50 kyr timescale can be explained on the basis of the present day global drainage system in conjunction with the perturbations expected to accompany climate changes over the past 300 kyr

palaeoenvironment and palaeoclimate of the middle miocene lake in the steinheim basin sw germany a reconstruction from c o and sr isotopes of fossil remains a differentiated reconstruction of palaeolimnologic environmental and climatic conditions is presented for the middle miocene long term freshwater lake 14 3 to 13 5 ma of the steinheim basin on the basis of a combined c o and sr isotope study of sympatric skeletal fossils of aquatic and terrestrial organisms from the lake sediments the oxygen isotope composition for lake water of the steinheim basin 18oh2o 2 0 0 4 vsmow n 6 was reconstructed from measurements of 18opo4 of aquatic turtle bones the drinking water calculated from the enamel of large mammals proboscideans rhinocerotids equids cervids suids has 18oh2o values 18oh2o 5 9 1 7 vsmow n 31 typical for middle miocene meteoric water of the area this 18oh2o value corresponds to a mean annual air temperature mat of 18 8 3 8 c calculated using a modern day 18oh2o mat relation hence large mammals did not use the lake water as principal drinking water in contrast small mammals especially the then abundant pika prolagus oeningensis drank from 18o enriched water sources 18oh2o 2 7 2 3 vsmow n 7 such as the lake water differences in sr and o isotopic compositions between large and small mammal teeth indicate different home ranges and drinking behaviour and support migration of some large mammals between the swabian alb plateau and the nearby molasse basin while small mammals ingested their food and water locally changes in the lake level water chemistry and temperature were inferred using isotopic compositions of ostracod and gastropod shells from a composite lake sediment profile calcitic ostracod valves ilyocypris binocularis 18o 1 7 1 2 vpdb 13c 0 5 0 9 vpdb n 68 and aragonitic gastropod shells gyraulus spp 18o 2 0 1 3 vpdb 13c 1 1 1 3 vpdb n 89 have 18o and 13c values similar to or even higher than those of marine carbonates 13c values of the biogenic carbonates parallel lake level fluctuations while 18o values scatter around 2 2 and reflect the short term variability of meteoric water inflow vs longer term evaporation 87sr 86sr ratios of aragonitic gyraulus spp gastropod shells parallel the lake level fluctuations reflecting variable inputs of groundwater and surface waters using a water 18oh2o value of 2 0 vsmow water temperatures calculated from skeletal tissue 18o values of ostracods are 16 7 5 0 c gastropods 20 6 5 6 c otoliths 21 8 1 4 c and fish teeth 17 0 2 7 c the calculated mat 19 c lake water temperatures 17 to 22 c and the 18o enriched water compositions are indicative of warm temperate climatic conditions possibly with a high humidity during this period vegetation in the area surrounding the basin was largely of the c3 type as indicated by carbon isotopic compositions of tooth enamel from large mammals 13c 11 1 1 1 vpdb n 40

migration of sharks into freshwater systems during the miocene and implications for alpine paleoelevation trace element and isotopic compositions of fossilized shark teeth sampled from miocene marine sediments of the north alpine molasse basin the vienna basin and the pannonian basin generally show evidence of formation in a marine environment under conditions geochemically equivalent to the open ocean in contrast two of eight shark teeth from the swiss upper marine molasse locality of la moliere have extremely low 18o values 10 3 and 11 3 and low 87sr 86sr ratios 0 707840 and 0 707812 compared to other teeth from this locality 21 1 22 4 and 0 708421 0 708630 the rare earth element ree abundances and patterns from la moliere not only differ between dentine and enameloid of the same tooth but also between different teeth supporting variable conditions of diagenesis at this site however the ree patterns of enameloid from the exotic teeth analyzed for o and sr isotopic compositions are similar to those of teeth that have o and sr isotopic compositions typical of a marine setting at this site collectively this suggests that the two exotic teeth were formed while the sharks frequented a freshwater environment with very low 18o content and sr isotopic composition controlled by mesozoic calcareous rocks this is consistent with a paleogeography of high elevation 2300 m miocene alps adjacent to a marginal sea

origin and migration of the alpine iceman the alpine iceman provides a unique window into the neolithic copper age of europe we compared the radiogenic strontium and lead and stable oxygen and carbon isotope composition of the iceman s teeth and bones as well as 40ar 39ar mica ages from his intestine to local geology and hydrology and we inferred his habitat and range from childhood to adult life the iceman s origin can be restricted to a few valleys within 60 kilometers south east of the discovery site his migration during adulthood is indicated by contrasting isotopic compositions of enamel bones and intestinal content this demonstrates that the alpine valleys of central europe were permanently inhabited during the terminal neolithic

the influence of local bedrock an important consideration in the interpretation of textural and mineralogic analyses of till abstract bedrock produces variations in texture and composition of tills not only on a regional scale but also on a local one bedrock influence is evident in wisconsinan tills in an area as small as a township in the allegheny plateau of northeastern ohio generally till sheets of the plateau fine upward with decreasing age within the mogadore and northampton tills samples from borings terminating in sandstone bedrock on the upland contain significantly more sand and have higher quartz feldspar ratios than those from the same tills overlying lacustrine silts and clays in the valley on the upland samples from the northampton till overlying sandstone contains slightly more sand than that from the same till overlying shale and siltstone however quartz feldspar ratios increase down ice from sandstone bedrock highs a few kilometers of transport may have been required for ice to crush plucked sandstone fragments which added more quartz to the fine sand fraction of the northampton till geologists mapping tills using soil associations should be aware of textural and lithological variations produced by local bedrock

rapid sediment accumulation and microbial mineralization in forests of the mangrove kandelia candel in the jiulongjiang estuary china abstract rates of sediment accumulation and microbial mineralization were examined at three kandelia candel forests spanning the intertidal zone along the south coastline of the heavily urbanized jiulongljiang estuary fujian province china mass sediment accumulation rates were rapid range 10 62 kg m 2 y 1 but decreased from the low to the high intertidal zone high levels of radionuclides suggest that these sediments originate from erosion of agricultural soils within the catchment mineralization of sediment carbon and nitrogen was correspondingly rapid with total rate of mineralization ranging from 135 to 191 mol c m 2 y 1 and 9 to 11 mol n m 2 y 1 rates were faster in summer than in autumn winter rates of mineralization efficiency 70 93 for c 69 92 for n increased as burial efficiency 7 30 for c 8 31 for n decreased from the low to the high intertidal mangroves sulphate reduction was the dominant metabolic pathway to a depth of 1 m with rates 19 281 mmol s m 2 d 1 exceeding those measured in other intertidal deposits there is some evidence that fe and mn reduction oxidation cycles are coupled to the activities of live roots within the 0 40 cm depth horizon oxic respiration accounted for 5 12 of total carbon mineralization methane flux was slow and highly variable when detectable range 5 66 mol ch 4 m 2 d 1 nitrous oxide flux was also highly variable but within the range 1 6 106 5 mol n 2 o m 2 d 1 measured in other intertidal sediments rates of denitrification were rapid ranging from 1106 to 3780 mol n 2 m 2 d 1 and equating to 11 20 of total sediment nitrogen inputs denitrification was supported by rapid nh 4 release within surface deposits range 3 6 6 1 mmol m 2 d 1 our results support the notion that mangrove forests are net accumulation sites for sediment and associated elements within estuaries especially kandelia candel forests receiving significant inputs as a direct result of intense human activity along the south china coast

evaluation of shark tooth diagenesis screening methods and the application of their stable oxygen isotope data for palaeoenvironmental reconstructions the 18o po4 of shark teeth can be used as a geochemical proxy for the palaeoenvironment during tooth mineralization a well preserved state of the teeth is necessary for this approach we used polarization cathodoluminescence cl and scanning electron microscopy to investigate two fossil shark teeth sphenodus nitidus from the late jurassic nusplingen plattenkalk the data are compared with those for two recent shark teeth hemipristis elongata lamiopsis temminckii 18o po4 of six further jurassic shark teeth was measured and is compared with 18o data from co occurring belemnite rostra and carbonate sediments the enameloid of both the fossil and the recent shark teeth shows orange red cl which is due to incorporation of mn during biomineralization the 18o po4 values of the fossil enameloid are constant around 21 50 v smow whereas those of the fossil dentine are more negative with values around 20 v smow which indicates that the enameloid is well preserved palaeotemperatures calculated from the enameloid are like those derived from belemnites we demonstrate that cl microscopy should only be used cautiously as a diagenesis screening method for fossil biophosphates geochemical and microstructural analyses of tissue types with different susceptibility to diagenetic alteration on the other hand provide an effective way to identify well preserved tissues supplementary material polarization microscopy images energy dispersive x ray data and cathodoluminescence spectra are available at https doi org 10 6084 m9 figshare c 4373720

cosmopolitan catterick isotopic evidence for population mobility on rome s northern frontier in order to investigate how the population diversity at major romano british urban centres compared to small towns and military outposts we conducted multi isotope carbon nitrogen oxygen and strontium analyses of bones 42 individuals and teeth 26 individuals of human skeletons from cataractonium roman catterick in north yorkshire u k the results suggest a markedly less diverse population at catterick than at the larger towns significant differences are observed between burials from the town and fort area and the suburb of bainesse to the south and it is suggested that these reflect a shift to more localised recruitment for the roman army in the late roman period isotope data for the bainesse eunuch an unusual 4th century burial that has been interpreted as the remains of a transvestite priest of cybele are not ultimately conclusive but consistent with origins in southern britain or areas with a similar climate abroad this paper also presents strontium isotope data for modern vegetation samples from 17 sites in the catterick northern vale of york area which contribute to a continuing effort to map the biosphere 87sr 86sr variation in britain

glacial meltwater input to the alaska coastal current evidence from oxygen isotope measurements results of a study of the oxygen isotopic composition of coastal pelagic and fresh waters from the northern gulf of alaska region are presented this study was undertaken to investigate whether isotopic tracers could be of use in determining the important freshwater inputs to the alaska coastal current acc and whether they could confirm the presence of the acc in coastal waters west of kodiak island the alaska coastal current the major coastal circulation feature of the northern gulf of alaska can be distinguished from oceanic waters on the basis of its lower salinity at least as far west as kodiak island this study adds significantly to the small amount of oxygen isotopic information available for the waters of this region the isotopic results suggest that in late summer glacial meltwater may provide a substantial portion of the total freshwater runoff into the acc and that the acc does extend as far to the west as unimak pass

thermal evolution of tethyan surface waters during the middle late jurassic evidence from δ18o values of marine fish teeth 1 oxygen isotope compositions of phosphate from vertebrate tooth enamel were measured to determine the evolution of tropical sea surface 0 owing to limited growth of continental ice during the early middle oxfordian the resulting sea level fall is estimated to be at least 50 m and is compatible with a global regression stage the middle oxfordian thermal minimum is followed by a new warming stage of 3 4 c from the middle to the late oxfordian

carbonate speleothems in the dry inneralpine vinschgau valley northernmost italy witnesses of changes in climate and hydrology since the last glacial maximum abstract an interesting association of slope breccia inactive and active tufa deposits and speleothems is present in the central vinschgau valley italy the occurrence of abundant carbonate cements in fractures and voids of crystalline basement rocks is unexpected considering the fact that this valley is among the driest spots in the entire alps low annual precipitation of 440 530 mm coupled with frequent wind give rise to a semiarid climate and steppe vegetation along the south facing slopes of the valley springs in this area are mostly supersaturated with respect to calcite and carbonate precipitation occurs locally as tufas and less well known because of lack of accessibility as speleothems in the shallow subsurface the majority of the tufa deposits and speleothems however are fossil speleothems are composed of low mg calcite and calcite aragonite respectively delicate growth textures including presumable annual lamination caused by pronounced changes in fluorescence intensity are preserved in both calcite and aragonite most calcite is a primary precipitate but small amounts of secondary calcite replacing aragonite are common in most aragonite bearing samples the highly radiogenic sr isotope composition as well as high concentrations of u fe sr and mg indicate that the groundwater from which these carbonates precipitated experienced intensive interaction with the host crystalline rocks the very low tritium concentrations and the lack of a seasonal o isotope variation in modern spring waters as well as their rather constant hydrochemical composition also support this suggestion s isotope data for dissolved sulfate and ca and mg sulfate precipitates indicate a sulfide source i e oxidation of sulfide ore minerals in the aquifer resulting in elevated sulfate and fe concentrations th u dating of speleothem samples using thermal ionization mass spectrometry yielded ages between 13 710 and 378 yr bp with most ages falling in the early to middle holocene although no isotopic dates are available for the tufa deposits field evidence strongly suggests that speleothems tufa deposits and carbonate cements in the slope breccia were closely related we therefore interpret the existence of these terrestrial carbonates as evidence of changes in climate since the middle holocene their presence suggests a higher annual rainfall during the first half of the holocene possibly because of enhanced moisture transport from the mediterranean

determination of oxygen isotope fractionation between water and phosphate from living lingulids potential application to palaeoenvironmental studies abstract lingulids are inarticulate brachiopods with phosphatic shells which live exclusively in marine waters their distribution is generally restricted to the continental shelf within the 40 belt from temperate to equatorial areas they show a range of morphological physiological and behavioral features that have remained remarkably constant since the cambrian the oxygen isotope fractionation between water and phosphate from living lingulids was determined as a tool to investigate the temperature and or salinity of past coastal seawater oxygen isotope measurements were performed according to the silver phosphate method on a collection of lingulids coming from well known and varied marine environments a global 18o variation of 3 5 was found for these lingulids which proves their good sensitivity to environmental factors namely the oxygen isotope composition and the temperature of seawater oceanographic data provided average temperature and salinity values in the living sites of the studied specimens least squares treatment of the data gave the following fractionation equation t c 112 2 15 3 4 20 0 71 18o po4 18o h2o which is similar to the equations determined by longinelli and nuti 1973a and kolodny et al 1983 for other phosphate bearing invertebrates and fishes all these results suggest that a unique equation describes the phosphate water fractionation of many marine organisms except for mammals

paleoecology of miocene crocodylians in florida insights from stable isotope analysis abstract fossils from late miocene localities in north florida offer new information about the paleoecological relationships between sympatric alligatorine and tomistomine crocodylians large robust tomistomines traditionally referred to gavialosuchus americanus outnumber alligator fossils at localities representing coastal estuarine depositional environments stable isotope analysis of carbon 13 c and oxygen 18 o values in fossil crocodylian tooth enamel carbonate co 3 provides evidence for niche partitioning between these two taxa which may have co inhabited estuarine paleoenvironments our isotopic results imply that alligators procured prey from primarily freshwater or terrestrial sources whereas tomistomines fed mainly on marine based prey items as indicators of saltwater paleoenvironments the fossil tomistomines may therefore be informative for tracking miocene sea level change

oxygen strontium and neodymium isotope composition of fossil shark teeth as a proxy for the palaeoceanography and palaeoclimatology of the miocene northern alpine paratethys the upper marine molasse sediments of southern germany were deposited during the early to middle miocene a period of significant change for the global miocene palaeoceanography palaeoclimate and the regional palaeogeography because of the ongoing alpine himalayan orogeny to address the influence of the alpine uplift on climate and oceanography of the northern alpine molasse basin a combined o sr and nd isotope study was undertaken on fossil teeth from sharks synodontaspis sp galeocerdo cf aduncus chaenogaleus sp and button like teeth from the bony fish of the upper marine molasse chrysophrys molassica average 18o values for hydroxyapatite of teeth from two sites are 20 3 1 0 6 and 21 2 1 0 5 while their average 87sr 86sr and 143nd 144nd ratios are 0 70850 0 00001 2 and 0 70882 0 00003 2 and 0 51220 and 0 51223 both at 0 00001 2 respectively by comparison to the sr evolution curve for the global ocean the sr isotope compositions suggest ages of about 22 and 17 ma for the teeth these ages are in good agreement with the depositional ages which suggests open marine conditions open marine conditions are also compatible with 1 lower average 18o values and 87sr 86sr ratios for the one site compared to higher 18o values and higher 87sr 86sr ratios for the other site 2 estimates for seawater temperatures which are similar to other estimates from deposits of similar latitude and age 3 a comparison of seawater temperatures with average ambient air temperature estimates deduced from continental palaeoclimate indicators nd isotope compositions are compatible with an influence of the north atlantic on the paratethys assuming constant salinity and seawater oxygen isotope composition a 4 c cooling can be inferred from average 18o values of the teeth between 22 and 17 ma this is similar to trends observed for foraminiferal records from the mediterranean tethys but different from foraminiferal and molluscan records of the north atlantic and the north sea during this period and allows for the possibility that the alpine orogeny had an influence on the regional circum alpine climate

the temperature of europe during the holocene reconstructed from pollen data we present the first area average time series reconstructions of warmest month coldest month and mean annual surface air temperatures across europe during the last 12 000 years these series are based on quantitative pollen climate reconstructions from over 500 pollen sites assimilated using an innovative four dimensional gridding procedure this approach combines three dimensional spatial gridding with a fourth dimension represented by time allowing data from irregular time series to be focussed onto a regular time step we provide six regional reconstructed temperature time series as well as summary time series for the whole of europe the results suggest major spatial and seasonal differences in holocene temperature trends within a remarkably balanced regional and annual energy budget the traditional mid holocene thermal maximum is observed only over northern europe and principally during the summer this warming was balanced by a mid holocene cooling over southern europe whilst central europe occupied an intermediary position changes in annual mean temperatures for europe as a whole suggest an almost linear increase in thermal budget up to 7800 bp followed by stable conditions for the remainder of the holocene this early holocene warming and later equilibrium has been mainly modulated by increasing winter temperatures in the west which have continued to rise at a progressively decreasing rate up to the present day

evaluating the impact of acetic acid chemical pre treatment on old and cremated bone with the perio spot technique and perios endos profiles abstract the impacts of diagenesis on archaeological and palaeontological bone complicate investigations of in vivo chemical and isotopic characteristics such bone is often pre treated in an attempt to remove diagenetic alteration prior to trace element or isotopic analyses although very few standardized approaches exist for evaluating pre treatment effectiveness in this pilot study we characterize the diagenetic alteration and assess the impact of acetic acid chemical pre treatment on the trace element and structural characteristics of four bones from belgium including an early medieval cremated bone from broechem and three representative old bones of different ages ca 40 130 ka from the late pleistocene sedimentary sequence of scladina cave each bone was analyzed before and after acetic acid pre treatment using the perio spot technique and perios endos profiles we measured trace element concentrations with laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry la icp ms and micro x ray fluorescence spectroscopy xrf structural characteristics were investigated with raman spectroscopy and fourier transform infrared spectroscopy ftir our results indicate that chemical pre treatment had little to no significant impact on the trace element content of the early medieval cremated bone had the most impact on the youngest bone from scladina cave and had less impact on the trace element content of two older bones from scladina cave this suggests that the effectiveness of acetic acid chemical pre treatment is greater for bones undergoing early diagenetic processes has minimal impact on highly crystalline cremated bone and may preferentially leach in vivo signatures from bones undergoing later diagenesis the weights of leachates removed from each bone also correspond well with their hypothetical diagenetic states indicating that researchers could potentially assess the diagenetic state of bones by weighing the leachates produced during acetic acid pre treatment therefore our new approach may provide a valuable step toward effectively and consistently differentiating among in and ex vivo trace element signatures and by proxy those of their isotopes in archaeological and palaeontological bone

sm nd in marine carbonates and phosphates implications for nd isotopes in seawater and crustal ages this study explores the possibility of establishing nd isotopic variations in seawater over geologic time calcite aragonite and apatite are examined as possible phases recording seawater values of nd modern biogenic and inorganically precipitated calcite and aragonite from marine environments were found to have nd concentrations of from 0 2 to 70 ppb showing that primary marine caco 3 contains little ree and that nd ca is not greatly enhanced relative to seawater during carbonate precipitation very young marine limestone and dolomite containing no continental detritus have 200 ppb nd all the carbonates are lree enriched 0 16 sm nd 0 45 modern and very young atlantic and pacific carbonates have nd in the range of shallow atlantic and pacific seawater respectively implying that they derive their ree from local seawater the nd in well preserved carbonate fossils is 4 10 4 ppb much greater than in their modern counterparts but like the high values found for carbonates in other studies we believe the high ree contents at the 500 ppb level in some detritusfree carbonates are due to ree rich fe hydroxide in on the carbonate in favorable cases such material may record seawater nd values however introduction of extraneous ree may obscure the original isotopic composition of pure caco 3 because of its very low intrinsic primary ree abundance modern biogenic apatite is also shown to have very low ree content 150 ppb nd but appears to quickly scavenge ree from seawater inorganically precipitated apatite from phosphorites has high concentrations of seawater derived ree young phosphorite apatite from the atlantic and pacific oceans has nd in the range of the seawater from these oceans older apatite samples of similar age from different localities bordering common oceans record similar values of nd t sedimentary apatite has sr t values in good agreement with the curves for 87 sr 86 sr of seawater as a function of time individual conodonts from a single formation yield the same sr t and nd t other workers have shown that sedimentary apatite preserves seawater ree patterns these characteristics suggest that sedimentary apatite can be used to determine nd t in ancient seawater the seawater values so inferred range between 1 7 and 8 9 over the last 700 my and lie in the range of modern seawater showing no evidence for drastic changes high values of seawater nd t in the triassic and latest precambrian may correlate with the breakup of large continental landmasses the initial nd t 15 0 of a 2 ae old phosphorite implies the presence of 1 5 ae old continental crust at 2 ae ago the approach outlined here can be used to constrain the age of the exposed crust as a function of time

thermal excursions in the ocean at the cretaceous tertiary boundary northern morocco δ18o record of phosphatic fish debris c lecuyer p grandjean j r o neil h cappetta and f martineau 1993 thermal excursions in the ocean at the cretaceous tertiary boundary northern morocco c lso record of phosphatic fish debris palaeogeogr palaeoclimatol palaeoecol 105 235 243 high precision oxygen isotope analyses were made of phosphate extracted from 17 samples of nektonic and benthic fish debris sampled across the stratigraphic cretaceous tertiary boundary in northern morocco a refinement of the silver phosphate method was used to isolate phosphate from biogenic materials measured 180 values of 18 6 20 5 o are interpreted as reflecting high resolution thermal variations that affected the ocean water column of the western tethys the warm 27 c water masses that characterized maastrichtian times underwent rapid cooling and stabilized at an average temperature of 19 c during the dano montian and thanetian this period of constant and cool temperature was followed by a relatively rapid but more gradual warming to about 25 c achieved in the middle ypresian significant small shifts in 6180 values between nektonic and benthic fauna recorded only during the stages of rapid warming or cooling may correspond to averaged thermal differences within the water column that developed in response to global climatic changes the indicated temperature distribution could have been caused by thermal changes in the atmosphere rather than some signal carried by deep ocean currents the oxygen isotope data coupled with previous measurements of ree and end ti on the same samples support the suggestion that paleo pacific westward currents progressed as far as the northwestern part of the african platform at the end of the cretaceous period

timescales and mechanisms of ree and hf uptake in fossil bones abstract rare earth element ree patterns of fossil bones and teeth are widely used as proxies for provenance taphonomy and palaeoenvironment in order to investigate if fossil bones behave as closed systems over geologic time ree profiles were analysed by la icpms along cross sections of 54 bones from various well characterised and well dated settings these include terrestrial and marine diagenetic environments covering early triassic to holocene ages in general all fossil bones exhibit the highest ree concentrations at the outer rim gradually decreasing by up to four orders of magnitude toward the inner bone cortex intra bone ree concentration gradients decrease significantly from quaternary via tertiary to mesozoic specimens suggesting long term ree uptake and open system behaviour of fossil bone this view is further corroborated by 176lu 176hf dating of selected samples all yielding significantly younger ages than the known chronostratigraphic ages hence there is clear evidence for long term open system behaviour of fossil bones with respect to ree which is in marked contrast to currently accepted models suggesting that ree uptake is only early diagenetic although unexpected statistically significant four to seven point isochrons are observed for four fossil dinosaur bone samples and one upper triassic mastodonsaurus tooth with mswds ranging from 0 083 to 4 5 notably mobility of lu alone cannot account for the observed age patterns assuming constant lu uptake rates over time the radiometric ages should only be as low as half of the chronostratigraphic age however a six point isochron defined by subsamples of a single upper triassic mastodonsaurus tooth yields an age of 65 2 1 1 ma mswd 0 68 much younger than half of the stratigraphic age ca 234 ma hence hf must also undergo late diagenetic exchange likely mechanisms to account for the presence of statistically meaningful isochrons as well as for the late diagenetic exchange of both ree and hf are diffusion adsorption and dissolution reprecipitation processes

isotopic composition of precipitation in italy a first overall map abstract composite monthly samples of atmospheric precipitation were collected over different periods of time ranging from one to seven years at 77 different locations throughout italy these samples were measured for their oxygen and hydrogen isotopic composition to obtain basic information for hydrological and meteorological studies in this area on the basis of the results obtained a first map of the isotopic composition of precipitations in italy has been drawn up the main features of this map are the following 1 no isotopic latitudinal gradient has been found along the tyrrhenian coast from sicily to the italian french border despite the considerable range of latitude 2 a minor latitudinal gradient is found in the southeasternmost section of the country apulia partially favored by the local morphology 3 a marked shadow effect of the apennines is apparent along the southern section of the po valley and along the central section of the adriatic coast 4 the contribution of water vapor from the northernmost section of the adriatic sea affects the eastern and central sections of the po plain 5 the shadow effect of the alps is considerably smaller than expected 6 the isotopic vertical gradients calculated in nine different areas and based on groups of two to five different stations vary but are essentially close to about 0 2 100 m 7 when mean monthly temperature values were available their relationship with the isotopic composition of precipitation was found to be on average very poor 8 the relationship between mean 18o and mean d calculated for the collection locations shows shifts of both the slope and the deuterium excess when compared to the global meteoric water line these shifts are different for northern central and southern italy 9 in a few cases anomalously low monthly values suggest the existence of pronounced amount effects

87sr 86sr ratios in modern and fossil food webs of the sterkfontein valley implications for early hominid habitat preference this research addresses the potential contribution of strontium isotopes to the reconstruction of early hominid behavior at the swartkrans site in the sterkfontein valley of gauteng provence formally known as the transvaal south africa we report that while there is considerable variability in the 87sr 86sr of whole soils within a 15 km radius of this site available soil and grassland plant 87sr 86sr is much less variable and generally above 0 730 this value is higher more radiogenic than the 87sr 86sr of plants growing within the greenbelt surrounding the blaaubank stream adjacent to swartkrans and streamwater itself 0 721 the difference between grassland and riparian strontium isotope composition suggests a method for determining habitat utilization by early hominids in this study a geological explanation for a natural difference between blaaubank stream and grassland sr is suggested based on relatively less radiogenic sr having lower 87sr 86sr values in the carbonate component of the local dolomite when compared to other nearby geological formations the explanation was tested initially using a top down approach in which the 87sr 86sr ratios of water soil and plants from the entire blaaubank catchment were measured next a bottom up approach was used to examine swartkrans member i faunal species known to have obtained their sr from well defined habitats the results are that 1 pollution is not the explanation for the relatively low 87sr 86sr ratios of the blaaubank stream 2 swartkrans member i carbonate has a similar 87sr 86sr to that of modern blaaubank water indicating that relationships seen today existed in the pleistocene and 3 pleistocene riparian fauna have relatively low 87sr 86sr ratios when compared to fauna adapted to drier habitats together these results make it possible to interpret the strontium isotope composition of pleistocene early hominids from swartkrans in terms of habitat utilization

δ18o and δ13c values of modern brachiopod shells abstract researchers have not rigorously tested the hypothesis that calcite from modern brachiopod shells is precipitated in oxygen isotope equilibrium with ambient seawater isotopic variability at the intraspecimen and intertaxon levels has not been examined without such data for modern brachiopods similar data from ancient brachiopods cannot be accurately interpreted in this study a survey is made of 18 o and 13 c values of terebratulid rhynchonellid thecideidine and craniacean brachiopods from antarctica the bay of fundy curacao japan new zealand norway puget sound palau sicily and south africa this suite of samples provides a wide range of taxonomic levels temperatures salinities and depositional environments for evaluating the degree of isotopic equilibrium attained during precipitation of brachiopod calcite new data indicate that modem brachiopod calcite is not always precipitated in oxygen and carbon isotope equilibrium with ambient seawater calcite from the primary layer and specialized shell structures hinge brachidium foramen interarea muscle scars are depleted in both 18 o and 13 c a characteristic of biological fractionation or vital effects often found in other calcerous marine organisms our findings suggest that these portions of the brachiopod shell should be avoided during sampling of ancient brachiopods secondary layer calcite the material most often analyzed in ancient brachiopods has higher 18 o and 13 c values which approach and sometimes correspond with predicted equilibrium values therefore secondary layer calcite is the most suitable portion of the brachiopod shell for use as an ancient seawater proxy although near equilibrium precipitation in secondary layer calcite is encouraging to those studying the isotopic composition of ancient oceans these data come with caveats large intraspecimen variability in the 18 o values of secondary layer calcite 1 in some samples limits the use of brachiopods as precise indicators of the 18 o value or temperature of ancient seawater the 18 o and 13 c values of secondary layer calcite deviate from predicted equilibrium values toward the lower values of the primary layer and specialized shell structures indicating a measurable vital effect in most cases measured 18 o values are lower than the calculated equilibrium values dictated by seasonal variations in the 18 o value and temperature of seawater ontogenetic variations in the 13 c values of secondary layer calcite have also been measured and must be assessed when interpreting ancient data modern brachiopods occur in a wide range of seawater salinities and temperatures therefore the relation between salinity and the 18 o value of seawater must be known to correctly calculate the temperature of calcite precipitation from secondary layer 18 o values errors of up to 15 c are found if ambient seawater is assumed to have a constant 18 o value e g 0 smow and the 18 o values of secondary layer calcite are used to calculate temperature coupled with vital effects and intraspecimen variability these errors can obscure the resolution of secular variations in the rock record

oxygen and strontium isotopes from fossil shark teeth environmental and ecological implications for late palaeozoic european basins article i nfo fossil shark remains occur in both marine and nonmarine late palaeozoic deposits therefore their palaeo ecology is controversial the oxygen and strontium isotopic composition of biogenic fluorapatite in 179 teeth scales and spines predominantly of hybodontid lissodus and xenacanthiform orthacanthus xenacanthus bohemiacanthus triodus sharks from various late carboniferous moscovian to early permian artinskian basins of europe are used as ecological tracers to decipher diadromous or obligate freshwater lifestyle of the investigated taxa the 18 op values of the different shark teeth range from 11 7 to 20 2 within the different basins with mean values of 16 9 0 5 for the bohemian massif 16 2 0 8 for eastern germany 18 2 1 0 for southwestern germany 18 5 0 7 for southern central spain 17 6 0 4 for