Pretreatment of Terrestrial Macrofossils

Radiocarbon ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 62 (2) ◽  
pp. 349-360
Author(s):  
Margaret W Norris ◽  
Jocelyn C Turnbull ◽  
Jamie D Howarth ◽  
Marcus J Vandergoes
Keyword(s):  
Mass Loss ◽  
Last Glacial Maximum ◽  
Room Temperature ◽  
Authentic Sample ◽  
Small Samples ◽  
Sample Material ◽  
Terrestrial Plant ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
The Last Glacial Maximum ◽  
The Last Glacial

ABSTRACTAcid-alkali-acid (AAA) pretreatment is widely used to clean terrestrial plant macrofossil samples for radiocarbon (14C) dating. There is wide variation amongst laboratories in the AAA method details and less rigorous AAA pretreatment is often used on fragile or small samples. Yet there is little evidence as to the efficacy of the different methods and whether the use of less rigorous methods is justified. We investigated four variations of AAA pretreatment: acid only (no alkali wash); room temperature AAA; “standard” AAA at 85°C; and “aggressive” AAA at 85°C with alkali washes repeated until no discoloration was detected. We tested six different terrestrial macrofossils from four different locations and ranging in age from mid-Holocene to the Last Glacial Maximum. Our results demonstrate that while acid only is not always sufficient to remove young material, there is no difference in 14C age of samples pretreated by any of the AAA variants. We also observed mass loss of 85–90% in the standard and aggressive AAA pretreatments, and much more modest mass loss in the room temperature AAA pretreatment. Therefore, we conclude that room temperature AAA pretreatment is optimal to remove contaminating material from fragile terrestrial macrofossils while retaining the majority of the authentic sample material.

Constraining past bedrock surface temperatures at the Gorner glacier, Switzerland, using feldspar thermoluminescence for surface paleothermometry. 

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joanne Elkadi ◽  
Rabiul Biswas ◽  
Georgina King ◽  
Frédéric Herman
Keyword(s):  
Last Glacial Maximum ◽  
Room Temperature ◽  
Continuous Distribution ◽  
Planetary Science ◽  
Glacial Maximum ◽  
Past Climate ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
Exposure Ages ◽  
The Last Glacial Maximum ◽  
The Last Glacial

<p>Our ability to quantify past climate conditions is crucial for predicting future scenarios and landscape evolution. To date, reconstructions of the Earth’s past climate have mostly relied on the use of climate proxies to infer previous surface conditions (e.g. Jones and Mann, 2004 for a review). However, few methods exist that are capable of directly measuring past temperature histories, particularly in terrestrial settings.</p><p>The aim of this study is to contribute towards a more detailed understanding of glacial and interglacial temperature fluctuations across the Central and Western Alps, from the Last Glacial Maximum to present day, by constraining past temperatures of exposed bedrock surfaces adjacent to the Gorner glacier in Zermatt, Switzerland. This is done through the recently developed application of feldspar thermoluminescence to surface paleothermometry (Biswas et al., 2018; 2020). The thermoluminescence signal of feldspar, from room temperature to 450°C, is sourced from a continuous distribution of electron traps within the crystal lattice (Biswas et al., 2018). The release of this trapped charge is temperature dependent and thus, at room temperature, results in traps with a range of thermal stabilities with electron residence times ranging from less than a year to several billion years (Aitken 1985). Traps sensitive to typical surface temperature variations (e.g. ∼10°C) have been shown to lie between 200°C and 250°C of the TL glow curve (Biswas et al., 2020). From this temperature range, five thermometers (200°C to 250°C in 10°C intervals) can be used together as a multi-thermometer, and subsequently combined with a Bayesian inversion approach to constrain thermal histories over the last ∼50 kyr (Biswas et al., 2020).</p><p>In this study, the preliminary temperature histories of five bedrock samples with independently constrained exposure ages, exposed progressively since the Last Glacial Maximum, will be presented.</p><p><strong>References:</strong></p><p>Aitken, M.J., 1985. Thermoluminescence Dating. Academic Press, London.</p><p>Jones, P.D., Mann, M.E., 2004. Climate over past millennia. Reviews of Geophysics, 42, 2004.</p><p>Biswas, R.H., Herman, F., King, G.E., Braun, J., 2018. Thermoluminescence of feldspar as a multi-thermochronometer to constrain the temporal variation of rock exhumation in the recent past. Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 495, 56-68.</p><p>Biswas, R.H., Herman, F., King, G.E., Lehmann, B., Singhvi, A.K., 2020. Surface paleothermometry using low temperature thermoluminescence of feldspar. Climate of the Past, 16, 2075-2093.</p>

Reconstructions of the past distribution of Testudo graeca mitochondrial lineages in the Middle East and Transcaucasia support multiple refugia since the Last Glacial Maximum

2021 ◽  
pp. 10-17
Author(s):  
Oguz Turkozan
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Last Glacial Maximum ◽  
Glacial Maximum ◽  
Testudo Graeca ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
The Past ◽  
Precipitation Seasonality ◽  
Multiple Refugia ◽  
The Last Glacial Maximum ◽  
The Last Glacial

A cycle of glacial and interglacial periods in the Quaternary caused species’ ranges to expand and contract in response to climatic and environmental changes. During interglacial periods, many species expanded their distribution ranges from refugia into higher elevations and latitudes. In the present work, we projected the responses of the five lineages of Testudo graeca in the Middle East and Transcaucasia as the climate shifted from the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM, Mid – Holocene), to the present. Under the past LGM and Mid-Holocene bioclimatic conditions, models predicted relatively more suitable habitats for some of the lineages. The most significant bioclimatic variables in predicting the present and past potential distribution of clades are the precipitation of the warmest quarter for T. g. armeniaca (95.8 %), precipitation seasonality for T. g. buxtoni (85.0 %), minimum temperature of the coldest month for T. g. ibera (75.4 %), precipitation of the coldest quarter for T. g. terrestris (34.1 %), and the mean temperature of the driest quarter for T. g. zarudyni (88.8 %). Since the LGM, we hypothesise that the ranges of lineages have either expanded (T. g. ibera), contracted (T. g. zarudnyi) or remained stable (T. g. terrestris), and for other two taxa (T. g. armeniaca and T. g. buxtoni) the pattern remains unclear. Our analysis predicts multiple refugia for Testudo during the LGM and supports previous hypotheses about high lineage richness in Anatolia resulting from secondary contact.

WASATCH RANGE, UT GLACIER RECONSTRUCTIONS FOR THE LAST GLACIAL MAXIMUM AND LATEGLACIAL

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brendon J. Quirk ◽  
◽  
Jeffrey R. Moore ◽  
Benjamin J. Laabs ◽  
Mitchell A. Plummer ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Last Glacial Maximum ◽  
Glacial Maximum ◽  
Last Glacial ◽  
The Last Glacial Maximum ◽  
The Last Glacial
Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document