While radiocarbon is best known as a dating tool, this rare isotope can also provide unique and wide-ranging insights into the cycling of carbon in the Earth system.
paleoclimatology & paleoceanography
Posted inNews
How Animals May Have Conquered Snowball Earth
We know there were animals during Earth’s chilliest era. The question is, What did they look like?
Posted inEditors' Highlights
Marine Molybdenum Loss During the Toarcian Ocean Anoxic Event
The reconstructed loss of molybdenum during the Toarcian ocean anoxic event suggests deeply anoxic conditions during this time period allowing massive amounts of organic carbon being buried.
Posted inEditors' Highlights
A Drier or Wetter Future for Southwestern North America?
Bhattacharya et al. present evidence that expansion of the North American Monsoon explains a wetter southwest in the mid-Pliocene and suggest this mechanism can explain current monsoon variations.
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El Niño Varies More Intensely Now Than in the Past Millennium
Researchers found evidence for a strengthening El Niño in living and fossilized Galápagos corals.
Posted inEditors' Highlights
Clumped 18O –18O in Ice Reveals Past Ozone and Wildfire
Reactive gases like ozone are hard to preserve, but clumped isotopes and models provide clues to past ozone and suggest a global increase in wildfire at megafaunal extinction.
Posted inResearch Spotlights
Long-Lived Lakes Reveal a History of Water on Mars
High-resolution imagery of newly discovered paleolakes shows a period of consistent liquid water flow.
Posted inEditors' Highlights
New Mechanism for “Giant” Greigite Growth in Deep-Sea Sediments
Understanding greigite formation pathways in sediments is a prerequisite for assessing the marine iron-sulfur-carbon cycle and yield reliable near-syn-sedimentary paleomagnetic records.
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Did a Chaotic Climate Drive Human Evolution?
A new 620,000-year climate record from East Africa reveals dramatic swings between wet and dry conditions that may have influenced human evolution.
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A Mysterious Dome Reveals Clues to Australia’s Miocene History
The Nullarbor Plain has been relatively untouched by geological forces, leaving traces of the continent’s deep past.