a late glacial high resolution site and source temperature record derived from the epica dome c isotope records east antarctica the timing and synchronisation of greenland and antarctic climate events that occurred during the last glacial period are still under debate as is the magnitude of temperature change associated with these events here we present detailed records of local and moisture source temperature changes spanning the period 27 45 kyr bp from water stable isotope measurements deltad and delta 18 o in the recently drilled epica dome c ice core east antarctic plateau using a simple isotopic model site deltat site and source deltat source temperatures are extracted from the initial 50 yr high resolution isotopic records taking into account the changes in seawater isotopic composition the deuterium isotope variability is very similar to the less precise deltad record from the vostok ice core and the site temperature inversion leads to a temperature profile similar to the classical palaeothermometry method due to compensations between source and ocean water corrections the reconstructed deltat site and deltat source profiles show different trends during the glacial the former shows a decreasing trend from the warm al event 38 kyr bp toward the last glacial maximum while the latter shows increasing values from 41 to 28 kyr bp the low frequency deuterium excess fluctuations are strongly influenced by obliquity fluctuations controlling the low to high latitude temperature gradients and show a remarkable similarity with a high resolution southeast atlantic sea surface temperature record a comparison of the temperature profiles site and source and temperature gradient deltat source deltat site with the non sea salt calcium and sodium records suggests a secondary influence of atmospheric transport changes on aerosol variations

timing of abrupt climate change a precise clock 1 many paleoclimatic data reveal a 1 500 year cyclicity of unknown origin a crucial question is how stable and regular this cycle is an analysis of the gisp2 ice core record from greenland reveals that abrupt climate events appear to be paced by a 1 470 year cycle with a period that is probably stable to within a few percent with 95 confidence the period is maintained to better than 12 over at least 23 cycles this highly precise clock points to an origin outside the earth system oscillatory modes within the earth system can be expected to be far more irregular in period

crustal shortening in the palmyride fold belt syria and implications for movement along the dead sea fault system an edited version of this paper was published in tectonics by the american geophysical union agu copyright 1990 agu see also http www agu org journals tc http atlas geo cornell edu syria chaimov tectonics 1990 html

changing influence of antarctic and greenlandic temperature records on sea level over the last glacial cycle we use a simple model to analyse the relationship between ice core temperature proxy data and global ice volume eustatic sea level data over the last glacial cycle lgc by allowing the temperature forcing to be a mix of greenlandic and antarctic signals we optimise the proportion of this mixing to fit sea level data we find that sea level forcing is best represented by a mix of antarctic and greenlandic temperature signals through the whole glacial cycle we suggest that a distinct bipolar switch occurs which links eustatic sea level more closely with the antarctic like variability during the glacial period mis 4 3 and 2 and more closely to the greenland like variability during the last termination ti and the interglacial periods holocene and mis 5 this switch may be caused by the spatio temporal distribution of ice sheet collapse perhaps linked to glacial to interglacial changes in deep water distribution in the ocean which in turn drive changes in pole ward heat and moisture transport

patterns and processes of shell fragmentation in modern and ancient marine environments shell fragments are important components of many recent and fossil marine benthic ecosystems and can provide crucial information on past and present environmental conditions interpreting such fragments requires integrated knowledge in various fields and the information potential is therefore rarely optimally utilized this paper uses the definition of a fragment as being a piece of shell having less than 90 of its original form it then outlines the potential characteristics pathways and fates that shells and their fragments can have fragmentation is a key factor shaping the shelly part of death assemblages but it is difficult to interpret because it can be broadly caused by ecological biostratinomic or diagenetic processes and also depends on shell strength strength in turn reflects multifunctionality during ontogeny and depends on a complex set of skeletal and taphonomic factors therefore no particular shell parameter clearly determines strength but thickness microstructure type and degree of organic matrix have the strongest influence on pre and post mortality strength size measurements are usually less important for shell strength than thickness although ecologically complex size refuges from predation do exist similarly shell shape sculptural features and specific aperture types in gastropods provide various defence strategies rather than increasing strength per se key ecological factors of fragmentation include predation due to crushing peeling along with mistaken predation selfinflicted damage during predation and burrowing and more physical aspects such as impacts by stones modern studies must consider damage by benthic commercial fisheries or dredging by scientific vessels key biostratinomic factors include transportinduced abrasion littoral zone of surf washed beaches bioerosion and dissolution mainly sublittoral environments diagenetically fragmentation during compaction mainly occurs when shells are in direct contact with one another or with coarser grains taphonomic features e g drillholes have only minor influence a key step in interpreting fragments is to categorize breakage into repaired versus unrepaired diagnostic versus nondiagnostic and severe versus localized damage quantifying the above categories can then provide useful information on breakage patterns and underlying processes understanding the many characteristics of shells and their fragments is a significant interpretive tool in maximizing the information gain in palaeoecological and taphofacies analyses d 2003 elsevier science b v all rights reserved

application of the crosta technique for porphyry copper alteration mapping using etm data in the southern part of the iranian volcanic sedimentary belt abstract many of the known porphyry copper deposits in iran are situated in the central iranian volcanic belt the area under study is located in the southern part of this belt and covers an area of about 6600 km2 the climate in the area is semi arid given the poor soil development and poor vegetation cover but abundant outcrops the arid semi arid part of the belt is most suitable for remote sensing study enhanced thematic mapper plus etm images have been used for alteration mapping crosta method was found useful for enhancing the areas in which the regolith contains a high proportion of hydroxyl and iron oxide minerals the crosta method has been used on selected 4 and 6 bands areas with iron oxide and hydroxyl minerals have been enhanced by using six bands of etm data

the arabian continental alkali basalt province part i evolution of harrat rahat kingdom of saudi arabia the harrat rahat lava field forms a major component of an extensive but poorly known continental alkali basalt province extending from yemen in the south through saudi arabia and jordan to syria in the north the continental intraplate volcanism which produced the arabian lava fields harrats was contemporaneous with opening of the red sea collision of the arabian and eurasian plates and uplift of the afro arabian dome harrat rabat has evolved over the past 10 m y it contains two prominent lateritic disconformities which separate three stratigraphic units the shawahit 10 2 5 ma hammah 2 5 1 7 ma and madinah 1 7 recent basalts comprising 68 19 and 13 of the total harrat volume respectively the shawahit basalt is composed of coarse grained dictytaxitic olivine transitional basalt otb and minor 10 alkali olivine basalt aob which erupted through scoria cones and shield volcanoes in contrast the hammah basalt is dominated by equal volumes of fine grained intergranular to intersertal aob and hawaiite which erupted mainly through scoria cones and relatively few shield volcanoes sparse domes and flows of mugearite and benmoreite first appear in the hammah basalt the madinah basalt spans the full compositional range of harrat rahat 103 analyzed samples comprise otb 8 aob 47 hawaiite 32 mugearite 4 benmoreite 8 and trachyte 2 here scoria cones dominate whereas shield volcanoes are sparse and occur only in the lower madinah basalt domes and associated pyroclastic deposits are common the final events of harrat volcanism include 11 post neolithic eruptions 4 500 yr old and two historical eruptions in 641 and 1256 a d arabian harrat magmatism may have been initiated by partial melting of garnet perido tite in the asthenosphere at a depth 100 km accumulation of this partial melt at the crust mantle boundary 37 44 km may have resulted in miocene uplift of the afro arabian dome harrat rahat volcanism began shortly after significant initial uplift with the voluminous extrusion of shawahit otb lava chemical and petrographic data suggest that these otb magmas ascended rapidly with little crustal residence time the data support a model of open system fractionation for aob and hawaiite lavas of the younger hammah and madinah basalts in this model some of the potential shawahit otb was trapped in crustal chambers during magma ascent crystal fractionation in these chambers was accompanied by their periodic replenishment by rising otb magma this resulted in the mixing of magma types and the development of aob and hawaiite magmas which are anomalously enriched in highly incompatible elements the mugearite benmoreite and trachyte lavas are the products of advanced fractionation in these crustal chambers with little or no magma replenishment

primary productivity variability on the atlantic iberian margin over the last 70 000 years evidence from coccolithophores and fossil organic compounds 1 this study analyzes coccolithophore abundance fluctuations e g emiliania huxleyi gephyrocapsa specimens and florisphaera profunda in core md01 2444 sediment strata retrieved at the iberian margin northeastern atlantic ocean coccolithophores are calcareous nannofossils a major component of the oceanic phytoplankton which provide information about past ecological and climatological variability results are supported by data on fossil organic compounds sea surface temperatures alkenones and n hexacosan 1 ol index and geochemical analyses benthic 13ccc and planktonic 18occ isotopes three scenarios are taken into account for this location at centennial scale resolution over the last 70 000 years the holocene and the stadial and interstadial modes the different alternatives are described by means of elements such as nutrients upwelling phenomena temperatures at surface and subsurface level or the arrival of surface turbid fresh and cold waters due to icebergs low sea level increased aridity and dust during the holocene moderate primary productivity was observed mainly concentrated in e huxleyi specimens surface temperatures were at maxima while the water column was highly ventilated by northern sourced polar deep waters and warmer subsurface nutrient poor subtropical waters over most of the last glacial stadials surface productivity weakened higher f profunda and reworked specimen percentages and lower diunsaturated and triunsaturated c37 alkenones the arrival of cold arctic surface waters traced by tetraunsaturated c37 peaks and large e huxleyi together with powerful ventilated southern sourced polar deep waters disturbed in all likelihood the delicate vertical equilibrium while preventing significant upwelling mixing finally during the last glacial interstadials lower f profunda percentages nonreworked material and higher diunsaturated and triunsaturated c37 alkenones a combined signal is observed warm surface temperatures were concurrent with generally low oxygenation of the deep sea floor moderate arrival of northern sourced deep waters and subsurface cold nutrient rich recently upwelled waters probably of polar origin these particular conditions may have promoted vertical mixing while enhancing surface primary productivity mainly of gephyrocapsa specimens

rapid changes of glacial climate simulated in a coupled climate model abrupt changes in climate termed dansgaard oeschger and heinrich events have punctuated the last glacial period approximately 100 10 kyr ago but not the holocene the past 10 kyr here we use an intermediate complexity climate model to investigate the stability of glacial climate and we find that only one mode of atlantic ocean circulation is stable a cold mode with deep water formation in the atlantic ocean south of iceland however a warm circulation mode similar to the present day atlantic ocean is only marginally unstable and temporary transitions to this warm mode can easily be triggered this leads to abrupt warm events in the model which share many characteristics of the observed dansgaard oeschger events for a large freshwater input such as a large release of icebergs the model s deep water formation is temporarily switched off causing no strong cooling in greenland but warming in antarctica as is observed for heinrich events our stability analysis provides an explanation why glacial climate is much more variable than holocene climate

340 000 year centennial scale marine record of southern hemisphere climatic oscillation in order to investigate rapid climatic changes at mid southern latitudes we have developed centennial scale paleoceanographic records from the southwest pacific that enable detailed comparison with antarctic ice core records these records suggest close coupling of mid southern latitudes with antarctic climate during deglacial and interglacial periods glacial sections display higher variability than is seen in antarctic ice cores which implies climatic decoupling between mid and high southern latitudes due to enhanced circum antarctic circulation structural and temporal similarity with the greenland ice core record is evident in glacial sections and suggests a degree of interhemispheric synchroneity not predicted from bipolar ice core correlations

ice age paleotopography a gravitationally self consistent theory of postglacial relative sea level change is used to infer the variation of surface ice and water cover since the last glacial maximum lgm the results show that lgm ice volume was approximately 35 percent lower than suggested by the climap reconstruction and the maximum heights of the main laurentian and fennoscandian ice complexes are inferred to have been commensurately lower with respect to sea level use of these ice age boundary conditions in atmospheric general circulation models will yield climates that differ significantly from those previously inferred on the basis of the climap data set

ice sheet action versus reaction distinguishing between heinrich events and dansgaard oeschger cycles in the north atlantic 1 glaciers and ice sheets play an active role in the climate system and the global hydrological cycle the stability of continental ice sheets must be better understood for assessments of future sea level rise and to uncover the causes of millennial scale climate variability that characterized the last glacial period ice rafted debris ird in the midlatitude oceans and subpolar seas tells of widespread calving of icebergs from the northern hemisphere ice sheets during the last glacial period but the climatic implications of this ird are unclear does the sediment record indicate repeated dynamical collapse of the ice sheets with ice sheets actively forcing the climate system alternatively were ice sheet margins simply advancing and retreating in response to climate vacillations on the basis of simulations of iceberg delivery to the ocean during the last glacial cycle we argue that the marine record exemplifies both of these phenomena heinrich events were clearly episodes of internal dynamical instability of the laurentide ice sheet while millennial scale ird is more simply interpreted as a response of the circum atlantic ice sheets to dansgaard oeschger climate cycles ice sheets in different coastal regions respond differently to climate fluctuations but overall iceberg fluxes increase in cold periods peaking within a few centuries of climatic cooling regions with relatively warm wet climates scandinavia western north america and svalbard are the most sensitive to millennial climate variability with rapid response times and large millennial variability in iceberg fluxes

new example of devonian predatory boreholes and the influence of brachiopod spines on predator success three abundant devonian frasnian brachiopod species from the lime creek fm of iowa usa douvillina arcuata devonoproductus walcotti and pseudoatrypa devoniana contain boreholes pooled drilling frequency is 10 6 the boreholes are small usually 1 0 mm diameter cylindrical and drilled perpendicular to the shell surface the borings appear to be type a boreholes as described by ausich and gurrola 1979 j paleontol 53 335 344 based on multiple criteria including statistically significant stereotypy with respect to valve preference site on valve and size class of the prey the boreholes are inferred to be predatory or parasitic in origin for each species the predator preferred to attack the valve closest to the substrate regardless of whether that was the pedicle or brachial valve boreholes were concentrated over the muscle field on each of the three species the success percentage percent of complete holes was statistically lower 2 p 0 04 for the spinose devonoproductus walcotti 33 33 than for the non spinose but otherwise morphologically similar douvillina arcuata 54 22 in spite of the fact that d walcotti has a thinner shell this is the first quantitative evidence for an anti predatory function for brachiopod spines

testing provenance diagrams lessons from the well constrained cariaco basin abstract the fine grained sediments of the cariaco basin venezuela of the last 130 ky whose deposition history is well characterized were analyzed geochemically in order to test the validity of sediment bulk geochemistry as an indicator of detrital provenance several binary and ternary diagrams as well as the chemical index of alteration cia were tested for their capacity to discriminate the poorly contrasted detrital sources to the cariaco basin and to describe the temporal evolution of the contributions of these different sources most of the diagrams tested did not allow a good discrimination of sources or when sources were well discriminated did not allow an interpretation of the temporal variations consistent with the known history a relatively good discrimination of sources and a consistent interpretation of temporal variations were however obtained using hf vs th and la yb vs gd yb binary diagrams as well as ti zr th ti zr la and lu hf th ternary diagrams compared to the previous studies of the detrital content of the cariaco basin sediments the geochemical approach permitted the recognition of a sediment contribution eroded from the unare platform and gulf of cariaco during rapid sea level oscillations and the contribution of saharan eolian particles during the younger dryas preboreal and mis6 5 transition the choice of plotted elements was determined after considering carrier minerals so that different elements may be informative in different sedimentary contexts overall mineral sorting during transport appears as a major limit to quantitative estimation of the different contributions in particular mineral sorting leads to the selective enrichment of elements associated with clays al rb th and lree in sediments deposited in the basin unless the geochemical effect of mineral sorting can be measured it appears that quantitative provenance analysis should be performed on fractions of similar grain size instead of bulk sediment

patterns of drilling predation in relation to stratigraphy locality and sieve size insights from the eocene molluscan fauna of the paris basin abstract predatory drilling traces are routinely used to evaluate temporal patterns in animal behaviour however for testing such trends it is important to consider natural and methodological variability that may play a role in shaping drilling patterns the present study attempts to test this notion by evaluating the drilling patterns of the molluscan fauna in relation to stratigraphy locality sieve size 4 mm 2 mm 1 mm and taxonomic affinity at class level we studied drilling predation using molluscan specimens from three localities grignon la ferme de l orme fleury la riviere representing a variety of elementary depositional sequences eds from the middle lutetian strata of the paris basin the overall drilling frequency df averaged over the three localities is 17 bivalves show a significantly higher overall df 18 compared to gastropods 14 and scaphopods species composition and diversity has been used previously to resolve the debate on climate conditions of the eocene paris basin through a comparison to modern analogues we have used a similar approach by comparing predation patterns with recent localities of subtropical and temperate regions the available data from the eocene paris basin from the warm temperate northern adriatic sea and from the sub tropical red sea show very heterogeneous patterns depending on the drilling metric considered considering the strong patchiness of drilling predation within each of these basins and reported from many other studies we conclude that a climatic affiliation of the eocene paris basin based on drilling metrics is not yet possible

the presence of polynyas in the weddell sea during the last glacial period with implications for the reconstruction of sea ice limits and ice sheet history cores from a contourite drift on the continental slope in the nw weddell sea antarctica contain up to four sandy foraminifer rich layers wa1 4 with dispersed ice rafted debris ird interbedded with silty clayey sands and sandy muds accelerator mass spectrometry ams 14c dating on neogloboquadrina pachyderma from the foraminifer rich layers wa2 and wa3 yielded ages spanning the last glacial maximum lgm and marine isotope stage mis 2 20 319 28 543 cal yr bp and the middle part of mis 3 41 349 43 242 cal yr bp respectively we attribute the high abundances of planktonic and benthic foraminifera to deposition in a seasonally open marine environment given that the nw weddell sea shelf was covered by grounded ice at the lgm and probably during mis 2 and mis 3 and that diatom based reconstructions place the northern limit of winter and summer sea ice coverage to the north of the core sites during the last glacial period our results document the presence of a seasonal or perennial polynya in the nw weddell sea the polynya may have been formed by katabatic winds blowing off the antarctic peninsula ice sheet apis when it was grounded at the continental shelf break although polynya formation through upwelling of deep water cannot be ruled out in addition we argue that previously published data from the southern southeastern and southwestern weddell sea as well as the ross sea may indicate the widespread occurrence of polynyas along the antarctic continental margin during the last glacial period the widespread occurrence of polynyas could help explain how i aabw formation through brine rejection continued throughout the lgm and ii antarctic shelf benthos survived glacial periods the presence of polynyas through glacial periods also has implications for sea ice reconstructions from ice core records possibly biasing the signal towards a reduced sea ice cover finally we propose that the fringes of the apis which probably influence the presence or absence of polynyas in the nw weddell sea are sensitive to changes in antarctic temperature that may be related to a reduction in oceanic heat transport from the north atlantic

mapping proterozoic unconformity related uranium deposits in the rockhole area northern territory australia using landsat etm abstract the rockhole area northern territory australia hosts a number of proterozoic unconformity related uranium deposits the geology of the area features within paleoproterozoic rocks of the pine creek orogen near the unconformity with overlying platform cover sandstone of the paleo to mesoproterozoic mcarthur basin landsat enhanced thematic mapper plus etm data was used in the rockhole area to assist in mapping geological structures and lithology and to identify anomalous concentrations of ferrous minerals the product of alteration which can be indicators of buried uranium mineralization several image processing procedures were applied to the etm data to identify isolate and enhance mineralogical information as simple and complex false color composites etm 754 shown as red green and blue respectively was the best simple image overall complex images based on principal component analysis proved to be the most useful products sandstone shale and siltstone the target lithologies koolpin formation the target stratigraphic unit and bleaching pattern due to the removal of iron ii compounds the target alteration pattern were confidently mapped to provide information required by the mineral emplacement model which ultimately identified areas of likely uranium mineralization thus the contrasting behavior of the two principle oxidation states of uranium and iron can be utilized to map delineate bleached alteration zones associated with economic concentrations of uranium using multispectral sensors like landsat or better hyperspectral sensors

validation of taxon specific sampling by novice collectors for studying drilling predation in fossil bivalves abstract although bulk sampling has been considered to provide more robust information on predation in the fossil record than taxon specific targeted sampling previous work suggested that targeted sampling even by a trained novice can yield results comparable to bulk sampling the present study further investigates potential bias introduced by collectors with different experience levels by comparing drilling predation metrics for samples made by five novice and three veteran collectors we demonstrate that trained novices produce results comparable to those of experienced collectors and that results of targeted sampling are comparable to bulk sampling targeted sampling was performed in the lower waccamaw formation lower pleistocene at register quarry near old dock nc five replicate taxon specific samples were obtained by each collector for the bivalves astarte concentrica cyclocardia granulata and lirophora latilirata shell length and thickness were measured and position and size of drillholes were determined frequency of left valves drilling frequency prey effectiveness and size selectivity were determined for each taxon replicate for each variable the results for the novice collectors were compared to those from bulk samples and all veteran collectors nearly all significant differences in the unstandardized data occurred in the size related variables length and thickness when data were size standardized as in many other drilling predation studies only 3 3 of 174 tests for statistical differences in collection methods were significant and none of the 157 tests for differences in novice and veteran sampling was significant previous results were not anomalous use of targeted sampling in studying drilling predation is again validated and collector expertise is shown to have minimal impact

late cenozoic uplift along the northern dead sea transform in lebanon and syria an edited version of this paper was published in earth and planetary science letters by elsevier science elsevier science retains the copyright to this paper copyright 2006 elsevier science see also http dx doi org 10 1016 j epsl 2005 10 029 http atlas geo cornell edu deadsea publications gomez2006 epsl htm

meltwater pulse 1a from antarctica as a trigger of the bolling allerod warm interval meltwater pulse 1a mwp 1a was a prominent feature of the last deglaciation which led to a sea level rise of 20 meters in less than 500 years concurrent with mwp 1a was the onset of the bolling allerod interstadial event 14 600 years before the present which marked the termination of the last glacial period previous studies have been unable to reconcile a warm northern hemisphere with mwp 1a originating from the laurentide or fennoscandian ice sheets with the use of a climate model of intermediate complexity we demonstrate that with mwp 1a originating from the antarctic ice sheet consistent with recent sea level fingerprinting inferences the strength of north atlantic deep water nadw formation increases thereby warming the north atlantic region and providing an explanation for the onset of the bolling allerod warm interval the established mode of active nadw formation is then able to respond to subsequent freshwater forcing from the laurentide and fennoscandian ice sheets setting the stage for the younger dryas cold period the melting of continental ice sheets during the last deglaciation provided a freshwater source to the ocean that affected global sea level and the strength of the thermohaline circulation an exceptionally large melting event inferred from far field relative sea level records occurred

high resolution 40 ar 39 ar study of mount avital northern golan reconstructing the interaction between volcanism and a drainage system and their impact on eruptive styles we present a high resolution 40ar 39ar data set of a volcanic complex at mt avital northern golan which experienced a transition from strombolian to phreatomagmatic activity previous studies attributed this transition to a change in the drainage basin of a nearby stream due to the damming by a lava flow which resulted in flooding of the eruption site in this study we determined the age of different volcanic phases and events in the history of mt avital as well as that of the damming flow and examined the cause of the transition in light of the new 40ar 39ar ages the 40ar 39ar results show that the history of mt avital includes two main phases of volcanic activity an early phase at ca 800 600 ka and a late phase at 120 95 ka most of the activity of the late phase was continuous within the 40ar 39ar error including the transition to phreatomagmatic explosions which occurred sometime between 115 107 ka probably between 115 113 ka the age of the damming flow is 115 6 3 1 ka which suggests that the volcanic activity immediately reacted to the change in the drainage basin dynamics the activity culminated with lava flow eruptions the latest at 100 4 ka either due to the establishment of the tuff ring levees which prevented access of water to the eruption site or due to the migration of activity to the northern part and then to the southern part of the complex

similar meltwater contributions to glacial sea level changes from antarctic and northern ice sheets the period between 75 000 and 20 000 years ago was characterized by high variability in climate and sea level southern ocean records of ice rafted debris suggest a significant contribution to the sea level changes from melt water of antarctic origin in addition to likely contributions from northern ice sheets but the relative volumes of melt water from northern and southern sources have yet to be established here we simulate the first order impact of a range of relative meltwater releases from the two polar regions on the distribution of marine oxygen isotopes using an intermediate complexity model by comparing our simulations with oxygen isotope data from sediment cores we infer that the contributions from antarctica and the northern ice sheets to the documented sea level rises between 65 000 and 35 000 years ago were approximately equal each accounting for a rise of about 15 m the reductions in antarctic ice volume implied by our analysis are comparable to that inferred previously for the antarctic contribution to meltwater pulse 1a refs 16 17 which occurred about 14 200 years ago during the last deglaciation

comparison of oxygen isotope records from the gisp2 and grip greenland ice cores recent results1 2 from the greenland ice core project grip summit ice core suggest that the climate in greenland has been remarkably stable during the holocene but was extremely unstable for the time period represented by the rest of the core spanning the last two glaciations and the intervening eemian inter glacial here we present the complete oxygen isotope record for the greenland ice sheet project 2 gisp2 core drilled 28 km west of the grip core we observe large rapid climate fluctuations throughout the last glacial period which closely match those reported for the grip core however in the bottom 10 of the cores spanning the eemian interglacial and the previous glacia tion there are significant differences between the two records it is possible that ice flow may have altered the chronological sequences of the stratigraphy for the bottom part of one or both of the cores considerable further work will be necessary to evaluate the likelihood of this and the extent to which it will still be possible to extract meaningful climate information from the lowest sections of the cores

phase relationships between millennial scale events 64 000 24 000 years ago a core recovered on the iberian margin off southern portugal can be correlated with greenland ice cores using oxygen isotope variability in planktonic foraminifera which closely matches the ice core records of temperature over greenland our age model identifies the base of every interstadial between 64 000 and 24 000 years ago and uses the greenland ice core project grip timescale the oxygen isotope signal in benthic foraminifera on this grip based timescale is quite different from the planktonic record and resembles the temperature record over antarctica when this is synchronized with greenland using the record of methane in the atmospheric air in the polar ice cores we interpret the benthic record as indicating significant fluctuations in ice volume during millennial events and we suggest that antarctic temperature changed as a function of ice volume

a millennial scale u37k sea surface temperature record from the south china sea 8 n over the last 150 kyr monsoon and sea level influence we report 150 kyr records of u37 sea surface temperature sst and carbonate content with 150 200 year sampling resolution from the southern south china sea scs in the northern margin of the western pacific warm pool wpwp using images core md972151 the glacial interglacial sst change is about 5 c for termination ii 23 5 to 28 5 c and 4 c for termination i 24 to 28 c the simultaneous rise of sea level and u37 sst during termination i suggests that sea level change has played an important role in the scs sst variability by influencing the exchange of tropical ocean warm surface water with the scs through the sunda shelf region sill depth 30 50 m when sea level drop was less than 30 m relative to today s md972151 sst was constantly above 27 c a situation which occurred during mis 5e part of mis5c and 5a and over the last 11 kyr sea level change was also the main control on carbonate content in the scs this was lower during low sea level stands due to the dilution effect of enhanced terrigenous inputs within the limitations of our age model millennial scale sst oscillations 1 5 c over a few hundred years occurred frequently during the entire glacial period correlating reasonably well with the hulu monsoon record from eastern china and the dansgaard oeschger d o cycles recorded for high latitude regions in the northern hemisphere such correlations suggest a possible teleconnection between higher latitude atmospheric forcing and low latitude climate oscillations in the western pacific tropical region via the asian monsoon system carbonate content also reveals millennial scale oscillations during the glacial period with higher content correlated with higher sst millennial scale fluctuations of sst and carbonate contents at this low latitude scs provide additional evidence that high frequency climate changes are global phenomena

atmospheric co2 concentration from 60 to 20 kyr bp from the taylor dome ice core antarctica a high resolution record of the atmospheric co2 concentration from 60 to 20 thousand years before present kyr bp based on measurements on the ice core of taylor dome antarctica is presented this record shows four distinct peaks of 20 parts per million by volume ppmv on a millennial time scale good correlation of the co2 record with temperature reconstructions based on stable isotope measurements on the vostok ice core antarctica is found

modelling antarctic sea level data to explore the possibility of a dominant antarctic contribution to meltwater pulse ia abstract we compare numerical predictions of glaciation induced sea level change to data from 8 locations around the antarctic coast in order to test if the available data preclude the possibility of a dominant antarctic contribution to meltwater pulse ia mwp ia results based on a subset of 7 spherically symmetric earth viscosity models and 6 different antarctic deglaciation histories indicate that the sea level data do not rule out a large antarctic source for this event our preliminary analysis indicates that the weddell sea is the most likely source region for a large 9 m antarctic contribution to mwp ia the ross sea is also plausible as a significant contributor 5 m from a sea level perspective but glacio geological field observations are not compatible with such a large and rapid melt from this region our results suggest that the lambert glacier component of the east antarctic ice sheet experienced significant retreat at the time of mwp ia but only contributed 0 15 m eustatic sea level change all of the ice models considered under predicted the isostatic component of the sea level response in the antarctic peninsula and the soya coast region of the east antarctic ice sheet indicating that the maximum ice thickness in these regions is underestimated it is therefore plausible that ice melt from these areas the antarctic peninsula in particular could have made a significant contribution to mwp ia

coseismic displacements along the serghaya fault an active branch of the dead sea fault system in syria and lebanon examination of the serghaya fault a branch of the dead sea fault system in western syria and eastern lebanon documents late quaternary and recent left lateral fault movements including the probable remnant of a historic coseismic surface rupture carbon 14 dating and the presence of fault scarp free faces in soft late pleistocene lake deposits suggest coseismic slip during the past two or three centuries possibly corresponding with one of the well documented earthquakes of 1705 or 1759 with an estimated holocene slip rate of 1 2 mm a 1 the serghaya fault accommodates a significant part of the active deformation along the arabian african plate boundary these results suggest that multiple active fault branches are involved in the transfer of strain through the lebanese restraining bend

integration of k ar geochronology and remote sensing mapping volcanic rocks and constraining the timing of alteration processes al lajat plateau syria abstract the al lajat plateau southern syria is a quaternary volcanic field hosting numerous historical and archaeological sites based on the integration of k ar geochronology and remote sensing methods a new map is presented for al lajat plateau volcanic field and a chronological model for alteration processes such as weathering in relation to quaternary paleoclimatic changes potential use of the geological data in archaeological investigations is discussed the alteration patterns of ferric ferrous and clay minerals were identified by using landsat enhanced thematic mapper data etm methods and ratio images of 3 1 5 4 and 5 7 principal components analysis pca combined with crosta technique interpretation was used to gauge the response of weathered minerals using this technique high concentrations of ferrous minerals appear brightly colored in the third axis of the principal components analysis pc3 while oxides show the opposite in pc4 composite images consisting of ratio images 3 1 4 5 and 5 7 shown in blue green and red respectively appear to be the most useful for mapping the lithologic boundaries of the main lava flows based on new k ar ages the timing of the volcanic activity appears to have been between 56 9 ka and 266 6 ka three distinct groups of ages can be identified confirming the sequence of the basaltic units defined by remote sensing 1 the youngest unit belongs to tyrrhenian between 71 ka and 56 ka 2 the intermediate unit pre tyrrhenian to tyrrhenian between 114 ka and 139 ka and 3 the oldest basaltic unit surrounding the al lajat plateau is dated to at least 266 ka a chrono alteration model highlights the role of climatic changes in the distribution of the minerals at the surface of the volcanic rocks as a function of the ages weathering conditions during the post glaciation phase are responsible for clay removal in the study area integrating dating and remote sensing data are important for mapping the location and timing of past volcanic activity but can also be used to identify the sources of archaeological tools and architecture in volcanic areas such as the al lajat plateau

a box model test of the freshwater forcing hypothesis of abrupt climate change and the physics governing ocean stability 1 observations and an ocean box model are combined in order to test the adequacy of the freshwater forcing hypothesis to explain abrupt climate change given the uncertainties in the parameterization of vertical buoyancy transport in the ocean the combination is carried out using bayesian stochastic inversion which allows us to infer changes in the mass balance of northern hemisphere nh ice sheets and in the meridional transports of mass and heat in the atlantic ocean that would be required to explain dansgaard oeschger interstadials dois from 30 to 39 kyr b p the mean sea level changes implied by changes in nh ice sheet mass balance agree in amplitude and timing with reconstructions from the geologic record which gives some support to the freshwater forcing hypothesis the inversion suggests that the duration of the dois should be directly related to the growth of land ice our results are unaffected by uncertainties in the representation of vertical buoyancy transport in the ocean however the solutions are sensitive to assumptions about physical processes at polar latitudes

millennial scale instability of the antarctic ice sheet during the last glaciation records of ice rafted detritus ird concentration in deep sea cores from the southeast atlantic ocean reveal millennial scale pulses of ird delivery between 20 000 and 74 000 years ago prominent ird layers correlate across the polar frontal zone suggesting episodes of antarctic ice sheet instability carbon isotopes 13 c of benthic foraminifers a proxy of deepwater circulation reveal that south atlantic ird events coincided with strong increases in north atlantic deep water nadw production and inferred warming interstadials in the high latitude north atlantic sea level rise or increased nadw production associated with strong interstadials may have resulted in destabilization of grounded ice shelves and possible surging in the weddell sea region of west antarctica

the antarctic ice sheet during the last glacial maximum and its subsequent retreat history a review abstract an emerging body of evidence from studies of the last glacial interglacial cycle suggests that the east and west antarctic ice sheets have not advanced and retreated in concert the west antarctic ice sheet advanced to the outer shelf in most regions during the last glacial maximum lgm the retreat from the shelf commenced shortly after the lgm and continued into the late holocene the west antarctic ice sheet in ross and amundsen seas slid across a deforming bed at least during the final phases of extended glaciation this implies that at this time the ice sheet had a low profile differences in the number and locations of grounding zone wedges and smaller grounding zone features from trough to trough imply that individual west antarctic ice sheet ice streams retreated episodically details concerning the expansion retreat and behavior of the east antarctic ice sheet eais are more sparse the picture emerging is that the eais did not expand to the continental shelf edge during the lgm rather it achieved a maximum extent of a mid shelf position in some locations while in other areas the ice terminus was situated near its present location the timing of retreat along sectors within the eais appears diachronous and in places occurred prior to the lgm the antarctic peninsula shelf contained considerably more ice during the lgm than previously proposed the results presented in this paper support more recent published ice sheet models that call for greater contributions of melting ice from west antarctica including the antarctic peninsula to the post glacial rise in sea level

equatorward increase in naticid gastropod drilling predation on infaunal bivalves from brazil with paleontological implications abstract understanding the influence of spatial variation on temporal trends is important for interpreting evolutionary patterns of predation in the fossil record geographic data on naticid gastropod drilling predation are contradictory and mostly limited to the northern hemisphere this study examines latitudinal variation in drilling on 24 000 beach collected recent bivalves from 6 s to 34 s in brazil twenty eight localities representing 16 latitudes were sampled in the brazilian and argentinean provinces further subdivided into four smaller ecoregions northeastern brazil eastern brazil southeastern brazil rio grande analyses focused on bivalves exhibiting infaunal life habits increased drilling equatorward was observed at the assemblage level across several spatial scales localities latitudes ecoregions provinces taxon level analyses for eight genera drilled across multiple ecoregions generally indicated greater drilling among lower latitudes size standardization did not affect patterns at the genus level an equatorward increase in drilling was documented also upon restricting the data to localities characterized primarily by softer substrates fine to medium grained sediments and in limiting data to samples obtained by a single collecting strategy minimizing concerns regarding the influence of local environmental variation and different methodologies on latitudinal patterns in drilling latitudinal patterns in drilling may be related to temperature and seasonality in influencing metabolic rates as well as diversity and predator prey size distributions the results of this study do not correspond to existing patterns previously described for western atlantic molluscan assemblages of the northern hemisphere however they may help explain temporal patterns in the fossil record of naticid predation

a fossil record full of holes the phanerozoic history of drilling predation the evolutionary history of drilling predation despite a long and rich fossil record precambrian holocene contains a 120 m y gap late triassic early cretaceous drilled bivalve and brachiopod shells from jurassic deposits of hungary india and four localities documented in the literature indicate that drillers may have existed continuously throughout the mesozoic they may have been descendants of paleozoic predators unknown mesozoic carnivores or precursors of modern drillers a literature database suggests three major phases in the phanerozoic history of drilling predators 1 the paleozoic phase latest precambrian carboniferous dominated by rare to moderately frequent drillings in brachiopods and sessile echinoderms 2 the mesozoic phase permian early cretaceous with very rare or even facultative drillers that had little impact on marine benthic communities but nevertheless may have been present continuously and 3 the cenozoic phase late cretaceous holocene dominated by frequent gastropod drillings in mollusks

the low latitude monsoon climate during dansgaard oeschger cycles and heinrich events during the last 100 000 years dansgaard oeschger cycles d o cycles and heinrich events have been the dominant signal of past climate variability over greenland and the north atlantic the succession of stadials cold and interstadials warm associated with these cycles has been documented in records from the entire northern hemisphere south america new zealand antarctica the south atlantic and the southern ocean evidently climate forcing in the d o band affects both hemispheres the origin and cause of these teleconnected patterns is still unknown even if a large proportion of the cooling in europe and northern asia during heinrich events is a meteorological response to cold surface water in the north atlantic resulting from the surge of the laurentian and scandinavian ice sheets but this does not imply that the d o cycles are a priori caused by the collapse of these large icesheets a severe challenge to a primary origin from the northern ice sheet and north atlantic comes from the observation that warming in antarctica and the circumpolar current leads the north atlantic changes by some 1500 years charles et al 1996 blunier et al 1998 in the second part of the paper we investigate new deep sea records from the low latitude monsoon system mainly corroborating the result of schulz et al 1998 that the indian monsoon showed d o variability the abundance of eolian dust indicating continental humidity aridity in core 70kl from the arabian sea shows humid intervals which seem to correlate with temperature maxima in the antarctic vostok ice core apparently the low frequency sub milankovitch variability of the monsoon is associated with the southern hemisphere the d o scale component in the monsoonal climate on the other hand shows a succession of short humid intervals the sequence is most closely comparable to the greenland temperature record and to the stadial interstadial succession in the pacific santa barbara basin odp 893 in order to understand the global forcing of climate change in the d o band it appears necessary to quantify the phase relationships not only between d o cycles in the polar ice cores bender et al 1994 blunier et al 1998 steig et al 1998 but also between the low latitude pacific indian ocean and the high latitude records

laurentide ice sheet meltwater and abrupt climate change during the last glaciation 1 a leading hypothesis to explain abrupt climate change during the last glacial cycle calls on fluctuations in the margin of the north american laurentide ice sheet lis which may have routed fresh water between the gulf of mexico gom and the north atlantic affecting north atlantic deep water variability and regional climate paired measurements of 18o and mg ca of foraminiferal calcite from gom sediments reveal five episodes of lis meltwater input from 28 to 45 thousand years ago ka that do not match the millennial scale dansgaard oeschger warmings recorded in greenland ice we suggest that summer melting of the lis may occur during antarctic warming and likely contributed to sea level variability during marine isotope stage 3

k ar dating extended into the last millennium application to the youngest effusive episode of the teide volcano spain less than one thousand years dating of the youngest volcanic episode of the teide volcano canary islands spain has been performed using the k ar cassignol technique analyses of about 20 g of pure alkali feldspar yielded a weighted mean age of 800 300 years stratigraphic historic and archeomagnetic dating validate this age and rule out the hypothesis of the presence of significant excess argon contamination for this flow our result shows that the last effusive activity of the teide volcano took place shortly before european settlement in tenerife island this study confirms that the cassignol technique can be applied with success for historic dating and demonstrates that it can now even be extended to the last millennium

some outstanding issues in the geology of lebanon and their importance in the tectonic evolution of the levantine region abstract the concept of pervasive and disruptive late neogene quaternary strike slip tectonics in lebanon has made establishing a satisfactory pre neogene palaeogeographic and palaeotectonic history for the area difficult research has allowed clarification of three fundamental issues that permit the setting of lebanon against its adjacent regions to be more firmly assigned the first issue is the identification of the significance of the 100 km long nne ssw trending monocline of the western lebanon flexure this feature is interpreted as a modified and rejuvenated early mesozoic hinge line that is presumed to be the northern continuation of the carmel sinai hinge line to the south the second issue is the correlation of the mount lebanon bekaa and anti lebanon complex with the adjacent intracontinental palmyride fold belt of syria through recognition in each of common divisions in structural style between a higher northern zone dominated by broadly spaced box folds and a lower southern zone with more numerous closely spaced and more internally complex folds the third issue involves the identification of major two stage late cretaceous to palaeogene syrian arc tectonism within lebanon resolution of these issues suggests a tectonic model for the region whereby the levantine region formed in two main phases the first of these was the multiphase late palaeozoic early mesozoic rifting of the area which imposed a fundamental extensional fabric over much of the region the second tectonic phase was the subsequent inversion of these extensional structures in the two stage syrian arc deformation of senonian and late palaeogene age which gave rise to the main lebanon structures it is this syrian arc tectonism rather than the late cenozoic strike slip that was probably the main structuring agent which affected the lebanon area the transpression from the braided dead sea fault motion although locally complex is an essentially neotectonic overprint on an already existing fabric offset of syrian arc structures in lebanon suggests that the total sinistral motion of the yammouneh fault segment of the dead sea fault is around 47 km

reconstructing the antarctic ice sheet at the last glacial maximum abstract a reconstruction of the antarctic ice sheet at the last glacial maximum lgm constrained by geologic data shows expansion across continental shelves accompanied by little inland change this added peripheral ice volume contributed 14 m to the lowering of eustatic sea level at the lgm of the total expansion one third took place in east antarctica and two thirds in west antarctica

a minimum thermodynamic model for the bipolar seesaw 1 the simplest possible model is proposed to explain a large fraction of the millennial climate variability measured in the isotopic composition of antarctic ice cores the model results from the classic bipolar seesaw by coupling it to a heat reservoir in this thermal bipolar seesaw the heat reservoir convolves northern time signals with a characteristic timescale applying the model to the data of grip and byrd we demonstrate that maximum correlation can be obtained using a timescale of about 1000 1500 years higher correlations are obtained by first filtering out the long term variability which is due to astronomical and greenhouse gas forcing and not part of the thermal bipolar seesaw the model resolves the apparent confusion whether northern and southern climate records are in or out of phase synchronous or time lagged

rapid climate transitions in a coupled ocean atmosphere model recent geochemical data1 2 have challenged the view that rapid climate fluctuations in the north atlantic at the end of the last glacial were caused by the thermohaline circulation of the ocean being switched on or off instead these data suggest that the circulation pattern must have switched between a warm deep mode and a cold shallow mode probably associated with different sites of deep convection3 here i present simulations with a three dimensional ocean model coupled to an idealized atmosphere which show this kind of transition the mechanism for the transition is a rearrangement of convection in the north atlantic triggered by a brief freshwater pulse this results in a drop in sea surface temperature in the north atlantic by up to 5 c within less than 10 years the rate of north atlantic deep water nadw forma tion is the same in the cold climate as in the warm climate but nadw sinks to intermediate depths only while antarctic bottom water pushes north to fill the entire abyssal atlantic

gps constraints on africa nubia and arabia plate motions summary we use continuously recording gps cgps and survey mode gps sgps observations to determine euler vectors for relative motion of the african nubian arabian and eurasian plates we present a well constrained eurasia nubia euler vector derived from 23 igs sites in europe and four cgps and three sgps sites on the nubian plate 0 95 4 8 n 21 8 4 3 e 0 06 0 005 myr 1 we see no significant 1m m yr 1 internal deformation of the nubian plate the gps nubian eurasian euler vector differs significantly from nuvel 1a 21 0 4 2 n 20 6 0 6 e 0 12 0 015 myr 1 implying more westward motion of africa relative to eurasia and slower convergence in the eastern mediterranean the arabia eurasia and arabia nubia gps euler vectors are less well determined based on only one cgps and three sgps sites on the arabian plate the preliminary arabia eurasia and arabia nubia euler vectors are 27 4 1 0 n 18 4 2 5 e 0 40 0 04 myr 1 and 30 5 1 0 n 25 7 2 3 e 0 37 0 04 myr 1 respectively the gps arabia nubia euler vector differs significantly from nuvel 1a 24 1 1 7 n 24 0 3 5 e 0 40 0 05 myr 1 but is statistically consistent at the 95 per cent confidence level with the revised euler vector reported by chu gordon based on a re evaluation of magnetic anomalies in the red sea 31 5 1 2 n 23 0 2 7 e 0 40 0 05 myr 1 the motion implied in the gulf of aqaba and on the dead sea fault dsf by the new gps nubia arabia euler vector i e ignoring possible sinai block motion and possible internal plate deformation grades from pure left lateral strike slip in the gulf and on the southern dsf with increasing compression on the central and northern dsf with relative motion increasing from 5 6 to 7 5 mm yr 1 1m m yr 1 from south to north along the northern dsf i e north of the lebanon restraining bend motion is partitioned between 6 1m m yr 1 left lateral motion parallel to the fault trace and 4 1m m yr 1 faultnormal compression relative motions on other plate boundaries including the anatolian and aegean microplates derived from the gps euler vectors agree qualitatively with the sense of motion indicated by focal mechanisms for large crustal earthquakes m 6 where data are available on fault slip rates on plate bounding faults north anatolian fault east anatolian fault dead sea fault red sea rift they are generally lower than but not significantly different from the full plate motion estimates suggesting that the majority of relative plate motion is accommodated on these structures

late pleistocene to holocene marine transgression and thermohaline control on sediment transport in the western magellanes fjord system of chile 53 s abstract in the western strait of magellan in southernmost chile marine transgression occurred between 14 500 and 13 500 cal bp this is indicated by strongly increased accumulation of biogenic carbonate and first appearance of foraminifers in sediment records from that time until 11 500 cal bp sedimentation in the western fjords became predominant autochthonous due to higher salinity and clay flocculation and late glacial glacier retreat present day thermohaline zonation pattern extensively representative for the holocene and sedimentation rates indicate that westerlies hampered westward outflow of superficial 0 30 m water depth glacial clay rich freshwater from glaciated areas during the holocene isostatic uplift of the andes overcompensated sea level rise in areas with high glacial glacier loading this led to shallowing fjord sills and restricted exchange with marine water especially since high freshwater inflow produced strong pycnoclines and preserved old saline water in fjord bottoms to the east of the climate divide the seno skyring fjord system shows a year round stable stratification despite a strong wind induced eastward superficial current in the upper 30 50 m of the water column such currents enabled significant late glacial eastward transport of glacial clay sediment cores from this area indicate that east ward sediment flux slowed down during the holocene probably due to less intense westerlies investigated present day thermohaline characteristics of the fjord system across the superhumid climate divide of the southern andes indicate details of the exchange between marine and freshwater which are fundamental for evaluation of sediment transport pathways biogenic productivity and interpretation of paleoclimate records in this area

sea level changes at the lgm from ice dynamic reconstructions of the greenland and antarctic ice sheets during the glacial cycles abstract new experiments were performed with three dimensional thermomechanical models of the greenland and antarctic ice sheets to simulate their behaviour during the glacial cycles to reconstruct their thickness and extent at the last glacial maximum lgm and to estimate their glacio eustatic contribution to the global sea level stand the calculations used improved ice dynamic and isostatic treatments updated datasets on higher grid resolutions and refined climatic treatments based on newly calibrated transfer functions between ice core records and climatic perturbations results are discussed from a reference run with standard parameters that is compared with available glacial geological observations and from a series of sensitivity experiments focusing on isostatic adjustment thermomechanical coupling climatic forcing mass balance changes and basal melting rates and viscosity changes of antarctic ice shelves for the antarctic ice sheet we find that volume changes are closely linked with grounding line changes of the west antarctic ice sheet at the lgm the grounding line extended close to the continental shelf break almost everywhere ice over central east antarctica was generally thinner than today and varied mainly in accordance with accumulation fluctuations for the greenland ice sheet melting is important only during interglacial periods and the most sensitive period concerns the size of the ice sheet during the eemian at the lgm the greenland ice sheet extended beyond the present coastline to cover at least the inner continental shelf and thinned by up to several hundred meters in central areas for a plausible range of parameters the experiments indicate that at the time of maximum sea level depression 21 kyr bp the antarctic ice sheet contributed 14 18 m to the sea level lowering and the greenland ice sheet 2 3 m significantly less than the older climap reconstructions whereas both ice sheets were at 21 kyr bp close to their maximum extent the experiments also indicate that their maximum volumes were reached only by 16 5 kyr bp greenland and 10 kyr bp antarctica equal to an additional sea level lowering of respectively 0 4 and 3 7 m holocene retreat was essentially complete by 5 kyr bp in greenland but is found to still continue today in west antarctica before reversing to growth during the next millenium the models were found to reproduce gross features of the ice sheet s history since the lgm in reasonably good agreement with available glacial geological data although observational control on ice thickness changes remains very limited

mineralogy and geochemistry of a marine sequence gulf of salerno italy abstract within the context of a multidisciplinary study aiming at the paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic reconstruction in the last 28 000 yr of the southern tyrrhenian sea west mediterranean area geochemical and mineralogical investigations were performed on sea sediments of a 6 17 m long core collected in the gulf of salerno southern italy 14 42 24 e 40 28 92 n at 292 m bsl the mineralogy of the sedimentary sequence was controlled by climatic changes fluvial discharge processes and hydrodynamic conditions that occurred in the southern tyrrhenian sea during the last glacial post glacial transition notable was the occurrence of detrital mineral phases quartz calcite dolomite clay minerals volcanic glass pumice sanidine clinopyroxene biotite and leucite in response to terrigenous input through intensive periods of precipitation runoff and sele river discharge changes in the clay mineral assemblage during the holocene from 9500 to 6000 yr bp indicate increasing precipitation in the source area pyrite and barite crystallization related to biogeochemical cycles were found to affect chemical conditions of the sedimentary environment irregular crystals of analcime were produced by alteration of the ad 79 vesuvius eruption pumice the distribution of major and trace elements between stratigraphic layers was influenced by mineralogy concentrations of redox sensitive elements fe mn zn ni cu largely depended on organic matter and sulphur whereas for most of the others a key role was played by clay minerals enhanced ba content was found at the 320 and 160 cm levels increased pb content was observed at the surface bcr sequential extraction showed that cu and pb in the sediments were prevalently associated with oxidizable components primarily sulphides zn ni and mn were strongly bound to residual mineral phases likely of volcanic origin fe was found mainly associated with easily reducible oxide phases and as pyrite

sea level fingerprinting as a direct test for the source of global meltwater pulse ia the ice reservoir that served as the source for the meltwater pulse ia remains enigmatic and controversial we show that each of the melting scenarios that have been proposed for the event produces a distinct variation or fingerprint in the global distribution of meltwater we compare sea level fingerprints associated with various melting scenarios to existing sea level records from barbados and the sunda shelf and conclude that the southern laurentide ice sheet could not have been the sole source of the meltwater pulse whereas a substantial contribution from the antarctic ice sheet is consistent with these records

on the timing and mechanism of millennial scale climate variability during the last glacial cycle the demonstration that natural climate variability during the last glacial cycle shifted rapidly between remarkable extremes has dramatically revised the understanding of climate change to further advance our understanding research continues into the timings geographic distribution and nature of the millennial scale climate extremes and into the mechanisms for intra and inter hemispheric transmission of variability through the climate ocean system complementing the traditional definition of the timings of millennial scale climate variability from ice core 18o records we here further narrow down the temporal constraints by determining statistically significant anomalies in the major ion series of the gisp2 ice core this exercise offers an objective definition of the timing of climatic anomalies in northern hemisphere palaeoclimate proxy records of the last 110 000 years that significantly improves the potential for inter calibration of ice core tuned chronostratigraphies we then present a process oriented synthesis of proxy records from the northern hemisphere this leads to a conclusion that the dansgaard oeschger d o style fluctuations in these records are virtually in phase since all fall within a clear atmospheric pattern of concerted relative dominance shifts between polar westerly dominated winter type conditions and tropical monsoon dominated summer type conditions finally we speculate on a monsoon related mechanism that could help explain the anomalously long duration of d o interstadials 12 8 and 1 which coincided with cooling trends in antarctic records

antarctic temperature and global sea level closely coupled over the past five glacial cycles sea level has varied by over one hundred metres across glacial interglacial cycles over the past 520 000 years an extended sea level reconstruction shows a strong coupling between these sea level changes and antarctic surface temperatures over the past five glacial cycles

antarctic ice sheet melting provides negative feedbacks on future climate warming we show by using a three dimensional climate model which includes a comprehensive representation of polar ice sheets that on centennial to millennial time scales antarctic ice sheet ais can melt and moderate warming in the southern hemisphere by up to 10 degrees c regionally in a 4 x co2 scenario this behaviour stems from the formation of a cold halocline in the southern ocean which limits sea ice cover retreat under global warming and increases surface albedo reducing local surface warming furthermore we show that ais melting by decreasing antarctic bottom water formation restrains the weakening of the atlantic meridional overturning circulation which is a new illustration of the effect of the bi polar oceanic seesaw consequently it appears that ais melting strongly interacts with climate and ocean circulation globally it is therefore necessary to account for this coupling in future climate and sea level rise scenarios

controls on messinian lower evaporite cycles in the mediterranean the messinian salinity crisis in the mediterranean 5 96 5 33 million years ago ma represents the most recent case of massive evaporite deposition throughout an ocean basin here we quantitatively investigate the nature of the gypsum marl cycles within its first phase known as lower evaporites le or primary lower gypsum plg 5 96 5 59 ma we conclude that to precondition the basin for deposition of the le plg sequence its connection with the open atlantic must have been reduced to about 3 of the cross sectional area of the modern strait of gibraltar using the modern strait morphology for scale this would imply a connection with a depth of about 50 m and a width of several kilometres we find that the le plg evaporite marl cycles may then have resulted from sea level fluctuations of the order of 5 to 10 m and or fluctuations in the mediterranean s hydrological deficit of the order of 20 previous work has argued that sea level control may be excluded because there are too many cycles to agree with orbital obliquity related timing however we argue from analogy with quaternary sea level records that sub orbital sea level fluctuations may easily reach the required magnitudes so that sea level control remains plausible

remote sensing for mineral exploration abstract remote sensing is the science of acquiring processing and interpreting images and related data acquired from aircraft and satellites that record the interaction between matter and electromagnetic energy remote sensing images are used for mineral exploration in two applications 1 map geology and the faults and fractures that localize ore deposits 2 recognize hydrothermally altered rocks by their spectral signatures landsat thematic mapper tm satellite images are widely used to interpret both structure and hydrothermal alteration digitally processed tm ratio images can identify two assemblages of hydrothermal alteration minerals iron minerals and clays plus alunite in northern chile tm ratio images defined the prospects that are now major copper deposits at collahuasi and ujina hyperspectral imaging systems can identify individual species of iron and clay minerals which can provide details of hydrothermal zoning silicification which is an important indicator of hydrothermal alteration is not recognizable on tm and hyperspectral images quartz has no diagnostic spectral features in the visible and reflected ir wavelengths recorded by these systems variations in silica content are recognizable in multispectral thermal ir images which is a promising topic for research

evidence for general instability of past climate from a 250 kyr ice core record recent results1 2 from two ice cores drilled in central greenland have revealed large abrupt climate changes of at least regional extent during the late stages of the last glaciation suggesting that climate in the north atlantic region is able to reorganize itself rapidly perhaps even within a few decades here we present a detailed stable isotope record for the full length of the greenland ice core project summit ice core extending over the past 250 kyr according to a calculated timescale we find that climate instability was not confined to the last glaciation but appears also to have been marked during the last interglacial as explored more fully in a companion paper3 and during the previous saale holstein glacial cycle this is in contrast with the extreme stability of the holocene suggesting that recent climate stability may be the exception rather than the rule the last interglacial seems to have lasted longer than is implied by the deep sea specmap record4 in agreement with other land based observations5 6 we suggest that climate instability in the early part of the last interglacial may have delayed the melting of the saalean ice sheets in america and eurasia perhaps accounting for this discrepancy

remote sensing for porphyry copper deposits in southern arizona landsat multispectral scanners landsat 4 thematic mapper three porphyry copper deposits used as test sites landsat data useful for delineating areas of iron oxide on the surface limited spatial resolution of mss hampered mapping of some critical geologic relationships synoptic view well suited for examining regional tectonic patterns landsat 4 thematic mapper is an improved mapping tool compared to the previous landsat scanners modified journal abstract

boreholes in the middle devonian blastoid heteroschisma and their implications for gastropod drilling abstract boreholes in over 100 specimens of the devonian blastoid heteroschisma and the presence of the gastropod platyceras orthonychia sp attached to a specimen of heteroschisma subtruncatus hall 1858 suggest that platyceratid gastropods were capable of drilling their hosts at least as early as the middle devonian and thus represent the first known gastropods to have evolved this ability the presence of similar holes in numerous other devonian and mississippian blastoids and the occurrence of several additional examples of platyceratids attached to blastoids indicate that the interaction between gastropods and blastoids was not infrequent as in the case of the gastropod crinoid interaction this relationship is interpreted as having been parasitic rather than predatory the parasitic drilling platyceratids may have been a factor in the paleozoic precursor of the mesozoic marine revolution some of the anti predatory defenses of crinoids described from the late paleozoic may have been strategies of avoiding platyceratid infestation

palaeocommunities diversity and sea level change from middle eocene shell beds of the paris basin the middle eocene interval at some paris basin localities was studied through high resolution stratigraphy abundance data 499 species 37 719 individuals on the distribution of molluscs collected at 12 shell beds of the middle lutetian and lower bartonian formed the basis for a palaeoecological study the middle lutetian succession is subdivided into several elementary depositional sequences eds interpreted as the product of relative sea level change species abundance distributions are better correlated with eds than with geographical locality suggesting that sea level played an important role in the distribution of palaeocommunities diversities were compared with analogous data from modern subtropical and warm temperate intertidal and subtidal communities we found that sea level variation is responsible for a major change in the upper part of the middle lutetian succession leading from high to low diversity palaeocommunities from base to top sampled palaeocommunities indicate a transition from high energy and mesotrophic eds 2 to oligotrophic low energy conditions of a sandy lower shoreface eds 4 to an upper shoreface eds 5 and lower bartonian the last with mangroves and a seagrass cover notwithstanding the lutetian cooling we found that subtropical conditions reached as far north as the paris basin our study suggests that climatic fluctuations might be obscured by facies control

rapid sea level fall and deep ocean temperature change since the last interglacial period we have dated huon peninsula papua new guinea and barbados corals that formed at times since the last interglacial period applying both 230 th and 231 pa dating techniques as a test of age accuracy we show that marine isotope stage mis 5e ended prior to 113 1 8 0 7 kyr when sea level was 319 m during mis 5b sea level was 357 m at 92 6 8 0 5 kyr having dropped about 40 m in approximately 10 kyr during the mis 5c 5b transition sea level then rose more than 40 m during the mis 5b 5a transition also in about 10 kyr mis 5a lasted until at least 76 2 8 0 4 kyr at a level of 324 m at that time combined with earlier data that places mis 4 sea level at 381 m at 70 8 kyr our late mis 5a data indicate that sea level fell almost 60 m in less than 6 kyr 10 6 m kyr during the mis 5 4 transition the magnitude of the drop is half that of the glacial interglacial amplitude and approximatelyequivalent to the volume of the present dayantarctic ice sheet during this interval the minimum average rate of net continental ice accumulation was 18 cm yr likely facilitated by efficient moisture transport from lower latitudes at three specific times 60 6 8 0 3 50 8 8 0 3 and 36 8 0 2 kyr during mis 3 sea level was between 385 and 374 m sea level then dropped to 3107 m at 23 7 8 0 1 kyr early in mis 2 before dropping further to last glacial maximum lgm values and then rising to present values during the last deglaciation times of rapid sea level drop correspond to times of high winter insolation at low northern latitudes and high winter latitudinal gradients in northern hemisphere insolation supporting the idea that these factors mayhave resulted in high water vapor pressure in moisture sources and efficient moisture transport to high latitude glaciers therebycontributing to glacial buildup we combined our sea level results with deep sea n 18 o records as a means of estimating the temperature and ice volume components in the marine n 18 o record this analysis confirms large deep ocean temperature shifts following mis 5e and during termination i deep ocean temperatures changed bymuch smaller amounts between mis 5c and 2 maximum temperature shift in the deep pacific is about 2 whereas the shift at a site in the atlantic is 4 under glacial conditions temperatures at both sites are near the freezing point the shift in the atlantic is likelycaused bya combination of changing proportions of northern and southern source waters as well as changing temperature at the sites where these deep waters form

heinrich events massive late pleistocene detritus layers of the north atlantic and their global climate imprint 1 millennial climate oscillations of the glacial interval are interrupted by extreme events the so called heinrich events of the north atlantic their near global footprint is a testament to coherent interactions among earth s atmosphere oceans and cryosphere on millennial timescales heinrich detritus appears to have been derived from the region around hudson strait it was deposited over approximately 500 250 years several mechanisms have been proposed for the origin of the layers binge purge cycle of the laurentide ice sheet jokulhlaup activity from a hudson bay lake and an ice shelf buildup collapse fed by hudson strait to determine the origin of the heinrich events i recommend 1 further studies of the timing and duration of the events 2 further sedimentology study near the hudson strait and 3 greater spatial and temporal resolution studies of the layers as well as their precursory intervals studies of previous glacial intervals may also provide important constraints

age dating and the orbital theory of the ice ages development of a high resolution 0 to 300 000 year chronostratigraphy using the concept of orbital tuning a continuous high resolution deep sea chronostratigraphy has been developed spanning the last 300 000 yr the chronology is developed using a stacked oxygen isotope stratigraphy and four different orbital tuning approaches each of which is based upon a different assumption concerning the response of the orbital signal recorded in the data each approach yields a separate chronology the error measured by the standard deviation about the average of these four results which represents the best chronology has an average magnitude of only 2500 yr this small value indicates that the chronology produced is insensitive to the specific orbital tuning technique used excellent convergence between chronologies developed using each of five different paleoclimatological indicators from a single core is also obtained the resultant chronology is also insensitive to the specific indicator used the error associated with each tuning approach is estimated independently and propagated through to the average result the resulting error estimate is independent of that associated with the degree of convergence and has an average magnitude of 3500 yr in excellent agreement with the 2500 yr estimate transfer of the final chronology to the stacked record leads to an estimated error of 1500 yr thus the final chronology has an average error of 5000 yr