All articles tagged with #sediment cores
A new study suggests that a comet impact may have triggered the Younger Dryas cooling period 12,800 years ago, supported by geochemical evidence from ocean sediment cores, though skepticism remains among scientists.
Scientists have used sediment cores and the Delft3D-FLOW model to test various earthquake models of the 1700 Cascadia event, finding that the earthquake likely caused at least 0.8 meters of subsidence and about 12 meters of fault slip. This study provides new constraints on the earthquake's size and offers insights into using tsunami deposit mapping and sediment transport models to better understand past and future seismic events.
Scientists have uncovered a 5.3 million-year history of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) using sediment cores, revealing its relationship to natural climate swings. The current's speed has been found to correlate with Earth's temperature, slowing down during cold periods and gaining speed in warm ones, potentially hastening the wasting of Antarctica's ice and increasing sea levels. The study suggests that the current's recent speedup is linked to human-induced warming and could have negative consequences, such as affecting the ocean's ability to absorb carbon from the atmosphere.
Mud libraries, such as the Lamont-Doherty Core Repository, hold marine sediment cores that contain Earth's history and serve as the backbone of climate science. These cores provide key information about the Earth's climate going back hundreds of thousands of years, helping scientists understand the impact of changing temperatures and greenhouse gases. However, funding cuts threaten the availability of new cores, limiting scientists' ability to predict future climate changes. By studying the composition of foraminifera and minerals in the cores, researchers can piece together a comprehensive picture of the Earth's climate over time. The loss of the JOIDES Resolution, a ship equipped for drilling high-quality cores, further hampers our understanding of Earth's history.
Climate change could trigger massive tsunamis in the Southern Ocean by causing underwater landslides in Antarctica, according to a new study. Scientists discovered that during previous periods of global warming, loose sediment layers formed and slipped to send massive tsunami waves racing to the shores of South America, New Zealand and Southeast Asia. As climate change heats the oceans, the researchers think there's a possibility these tsunamis could be unleashed once more. The researchers warn that future landslides, and tsunamis, could happen again as many layers of the sediment are buried beneath the Antarctic seabed, and the glaciers on top of the landmass slowly melt away.