Graduate Thesis Or Dissertation

 

The fluvial response to glacial-interglacial climate change in the Pacific Northwest, USA Public Deposited

Downloadable Content

Download PDF
https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/graduate_thesis_or_dissertations/9019s7045

Descriptions

Attribute NameValues
Creator
Abstract
  • This research focuses on the development of new techniques to explore terrestrial-ocean climate linkages along the Pacific Northwest-northeast Pacific Ocean margin. This is done by investigating river response to climate change and by unraveling this history preserved in continental margin sediments. A significant component of this work centers on developing a 40Ar-39Ar incremental heating method to fingerprint bulk fluvial sediment entering this region. Results show reproducible ages from individual rivers accounting for the majority of sediment delivered offshore. A 40Ar-39Ar detrital mixture model is developed to examine the fidelity of these results and shows that the bulk ages measured from river mouth sediments can be accurate indicators of the average age of feldspars eroded from a given catchment area. The bulk sediment ages are combined with Nd isotopic analyses into a ternary mixing model to better understand the sources of terrigenous material delivered to offshore continental margin sites. Downcore Ar-Nd isotopic compositions can be described by three general river sediment sources proximal to the core site, the Umpqua, Rogue+Klamath, and Eel Rivers, from ~14 ka to Present. Results from the ternary model also suggest that differential contributions of eroded material plays the primary role in provenance changes seen at the core site, rather than sediment transport changes due to ocean circulation. This research culminates in a modeling effort to examine downcore provenance changes. We develop a model that balances basin-averaged 40Ar-39Ar ages (detrital mixtures) of the contributing fluvial basins and predicts the bulk sediment value at the core site. We find that the Upper Klamath Basin (which contained pluvial Lake Modoc during Marine Isotope Stage 2) is the most influential source area that can contribute to younger bulk sediment 40Ar-39Ar ages at the core site, relative to present day values. The Eel River is also shown to have a considerable influence on changes in margin sedimentation. Combinations of increases in the sediment fluxes out of these two basins can describe the 40Ar-39Ar provenance evolution observed at the core site over the 22-14 ka time period. Overall, this new 40Ar-39Ar isotopic technique, together with the Nd isotopic system and the use of detrital mixture modeling show tremendous promise as a multi-faceted strategy to assess erosion and provenance change through the continuous history preserved in fine-grained marine sedimentary records.
License
Resource Type
Date Available
Date Issued
Degree Level
Degree Name
Degree Field
Degree Grantor
Commencement Year
Advisor
Committee Member
Academic Affiliation
Non-Academic Affiliation
Subject
Rights Statement
Publisher
Language
File Format
File Extent
  • 18308716 bytes
Replaces
Additional Information
  • description.provenance : Made available in DSpace on 2007-07-19T14:47:09Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 VanLaningham_dissertation.pdf: 18308716 bytes, checksum: 35d375f7357117719c19a17394c28b37 (MD5)
  • description.provenance : Submitted by Sam VanLaningham (samvanlan@gmail.com) on 2007-07-02T22:04:26Z No. of bitstreams: 1 VanLaningham_dissertation.pdf: 18308716 bytes, checksum: 35d375f7357117719c19a17394c28b37 (MD5)
  • description.provenance : Approved for entry into archive by Julie Kurtz(julie.kurtz@oregonstate.edu) on 2007-07-10 (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 VanLaningham_dissertation.pdf: 18308716 bytes, checksum: 35d375f7357117719c19a17394c28b37 (MD5)

Relationships

Parents:

This work has no parents.

In Collection:

Items