Testing the annual nature of speleothem banding

Speleothem laminae have been postulated to form annually and this lamina-chronology is widely applied to high-resolution modern and past climate reconstructions. However, this argument has not been directly supported by high resolution dating methods. Here we present contemporary single-lamina 230 T...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Scientific reports 2013-09, Vol.3 (1), p.2633, Article 2633
Main Authors: Shen, Chuan-Chou, Lin, Ke, Duan, Wuhui, Jiang, Xiuyang, Partin, Judson W., Edwards, R. Lawrence, Cheng, Hai, Tan, Ming
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
704/2151/209
704/2151/213
Age
Climate
Dating
Geology
Geophysics
Humanities and Social Sciences
Laboratories
multidisciplinary
Science
Wind
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Speleothem laminae have been postulated to form annually and this lamina-chronology is widely applied to high-resolution modern and past climate reconstructions. However, this argument has not been directly supported by high resolution dating methods. Here we present contemporary single-lamina 230 Th dating techniques with 2σ precision as good as ±0.5 yr on a laminated stalagmite with density couplets from Xianren Cave, China, that covers the last 300 years. We find that the layers do not always deposit annually. Annual bands can be under- or over-counted by several years during different multi-decadal intervals. The irregular formation of missing and false bands in this example indicates that the assumption of annual speleothem laminae in a climate reconstruction should be approached carefully without a robust absolute-dated chronology.
ISSN:2045-2322
2045-2322
DOI:10.1038/srep02633