Graduate Thesis Or Dissertation
 

Applying a Dynamic Time Warping Approach to Stratigraphic Correlation: Quaternary Magnetostratigraphy and Ediacaran–Cambrian Chemostratigraphy

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  • Magneto- and chemostratigraphic correlation underpins much of our understanding of Earth history, yet typical correlation techniques are neither quantitative nor objective. Within this dissertation, I detail my efforts to develop and apply dynamic programming-based algorithms that accomplish optimal and reproducible stratigraphic alignment. I apply these algorithms to three geologic intervals: magnetostratigraphic records from the Quaternary Period and stable carbon-isotope chemostratigraphic records from the early Cambrian and the Ediacaran periods. Directional paleomagnetic secular variation data offer a robust way to align important Quaternary paleoclimate sedimentary archives, yet these alignments have previously been done visually. In Chapter 2, I refine Quaternary Period magnetostratigraphic correlation by adapting a dynamic-programming correlation algorithm to simultaneously align paleomagnetic declination and inclination vector directions. I demonstrate that this algorithm can successfully align magnetostratigraphic datasets within radiocarbon uncertainty, thereby offering the paleomagnetism community a powerful new tool for stratigraphic correlation. The early Cambrian hosts the diversification of skeletonizing animals in the oceans, making this a novel interval of biologic evolution and innovation during Earth’s long history. In Chapter 3, I apply the correlation algorithm to the stable carbon-isotope chemostratigraphies sampled from shallow-marine depositional environments that have established the relative chronology of the early Cambrian Period. After documenting all plausible alignments between individual stratigraphic sections for Cambrian marine depositional basins (herein paleobasins), and all alignments of paleobasin chemostratigraphic composites to a temporally calibrated reference section, I then construct a new early Cambrian Period global composite stable carbon-isotope record. I generate multiple Bayesian-based age models with this composite record to estimate ages, with uncertainty, for each stratum in the global composite record. Both age model and alignment selection contribute to uncertainty in fossil first appearance datum ages. I conclude that accounting for this uncertainty obscures the magnitude, number, and timing of first appearance pulses in skeletal fossil diversification previously established for the early Cambrian Period. The Ediacaran Period hosts the late Neoproterozoic Gaskiers glaciation and the Shuram excursion, the largest negative excursion in the stable carbon-isotopic composition of shallow marine carbonate described in Earth history. Yet, the Ediacaran Period has a limited global chronology that does not support detailed investigations into the dates and rates of these events and processes. In Chapter 4, I use the dynamic programming correlation algorithm to align stable carbon-isotope chemostratigraphies to construct a new, global Ediacaran Period composite record. By incorporating all available geochronologic constraints, I then generate a Bayesian-based age model for the global composite carbon-isotope record, thereby extending each regional chronologic constraint globally. I validate this global composite record by investigating the predicted rate changes in sediment accumulation and carbon isotope for each Ediacaran paleobasin. Using this new global composite record, I identify widespread multi-million-year breaks in Ediacaran sediment deposition, and investigate the stratigraphic context of these breaks as well as the paleobasin depositional patterns contemporaneous with the Gaskiers glaciation. Lastly, I apply this novel chronostratigraphic framework to refine temporal constraints on the enigmatic Shuram excursion.
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  • I was supported financially by both the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program and the ARCS Foundation during my graduate education and dissertation research. The Geological Society of America and CEOAS for provided research and travel grants. In addition, to NSF EAR-1645411 (to J. Stoner) and NSF EAR-2025735 (to J. Creveling) supported this dissertation research.
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  • Pending Publication
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  • 2021-08-11 to 2022-09-11

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