The Incorporation of Rare Earth Elements in Coral Lattice: Proxy for Rainfall and Climate

小行星9616645 一 地球化学家所面临的任务 在理解地球气候如何随时间变化的过程中，最重要的是发现和发展了推断过去气候的工具（古代用品）。 古代用指标通常是某种古生物学（例如，化石forminifera）或地球化学测量（例如，氧或碳同位素组成），被认为与感兴趣的气候现象有关-温度，盐度，氧气，大气二氧化碳。 问题是，这些代用指标本身通常不是这些古气候条件中任何一个的结果，因此导致对古代气候条件的解释模棱两可。 在这个项目中，主要研究员将使用从各个地区收集的存档现代珊瑚样本，这些样本还有一个广泛的环境观测数据库，如温度，盐度，径流水文学和生物学。 由于稀土元素（REE）是通过大陆岩石暴露的风化作用提供给海洋的，他希望看到河流径流的REE信号-反映降雨条件-保存在珊瑚中。 如果成功，他将能够将这项研究扩展到更古老的珊瑚，形成地质记录，并与其他目前可用的古气候代理进行比较。 研究人员预计，这将导致开发一种新的工具来研究古气候。 ***

9616645 Sholkovitz One of the tasks facing geochemists interested in understanding how Earth's climate has changed over time is the discovery and development of tools (paleo-proxies) for deducing what past climates were like. Paleo-proxies are generally some sort of paleontological (for example, fossil forminifera) or geochemical measurement (for example, oxygen or carbon isotopic composition) that is assumed to relate to the climatic phenomenon of interest - temperature, salinity, oxygen, atmospheric carbon dioxide. The problem is that the proxies themselves are usually not the result of any one of these paleoclimatic conditions and thus lead to equivocal interpretations about ancient climatic conditions. In this project, the principal investigator will used archived modern coral samples collected from various regions for which there is also an extensive database of environmental observations such as temperature, salinity, runoff hydrology, and biology. Since rare earth elements (REE) are supplied to the ocean by weathering of rock exposures on the continents, he expects to see the REE signal from river runoff - reflecting rainfall conditions - preserved in the coral. If successful, he would be able to extend this study to much older corals form the geologic record and comparison with other currently-available paleoclimate proxies. The investigator anticipates that this would lead to the development of a new tool for studying paleoclimate. ***