Publications 2024

Nature Communications: Deep-sea hiatus record reveals orbital pacing by 2.4 Myr eccentricity grand cycles

by

Astronomical forcing of Earth’s climate is embedded in the rhythms of stratigraphic records, most famously as short-period (10^4–10^5 year) Milankovitch cycles. Astronomical grand cycles with periods of millions of years also modulate climate variability but have been detected in relatively few proxy records. Here, we apply spectral analysis to a dataset of Cenozoic deep-sea hiatuses … Read more…

New data set for refined boundaries between continental and ocean crust released

by

Earth’s topography and bathymetry with revised boundaries between continental and ocean crust overlain as thin red lines. We have released a refined data set of the boundaries between continental and ocean crust (COBs). The data can be downloaded from zenodo as GPlates-compatible gpmlz and as ESRI shapefile. The COBs are based on the data set … Read more…

Geology: Submarine volcanism along shallow ridges did not drive Cryogenian cap carbonate formation

by

The termination of Neoproterozoic “Snowball Earth” glaciations is marked globally by laterally extensive neritic cap carbonates directly overlying glacial diamictites. The formation of these unique deposits on deglaciation calls for anomalously high CaCO3 saturation. A popular mechanism to account for the source of requisite ocean alkalinity is the shallow-ridge hypothesis, in which initial spreading ridges … Read more…

Geology: Duration of Sturtian “Snowball Earth” glaciation linked to exceptionally low mid-ocean ridge outgassing

by

The Sturtian ‘Snowball Earth’ glaciation (~717–661 Ma) is regarded as the most extreme interval of icehouse climate in Earth’s history. The exact trigger and sustention mechanisms for this long-lived global glaciation remain obscure. The most widely debated causes are silicate weathering of the ~718 Ma Franklin LIP, and changes in the length and degassing of … Read more…

Tectonics: Differential Uplift Triggered Basin-And-Range System: Evidence From Low-Temperature Thermochronology in Eastern NE Asia

by

Since the Mesozoic, eastern NE Asia has experienced multiple tectonic events, resulting in a complex structure and forming one of the world’s largest Meso-Cenozoic lacustrine basin systems. Presently, basin evolution models require further elucidation regarding the simultaneous generation of diverse rift basins and the potential impact stemming from the closure of the Mudanjiang Ocean, whose … Read more…