Lake Titicaca: Toward a Detailed Record of Lake Quaternary Climate in Subtropical South America

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Abstract ATM-9624715 Dunbar, Robert William Marsh Rice University Title: Lake Titicaca: Toward a Detailed Record of the Quaternary Climate in Subtropical South America This award supports a pilot study that has two operational objectives: (1.) to undertake a high-resolution survey of Lake Titicaca, Peru/Bolivia and (2.) to recover several short (3 meters) piston cores from the large, deep basin of the lake. These cores are expected to span the entire Holocene and latest Pleistocene. Analysis of the cores will be limited to a preliminary survey, including determination of accumulation rates using radiocarbon dating, sedimentology, bulk chemistry, stable isotopic geochemistry, and composition of diatoms and pollen. This study will determine the best sites for location of the long cores and begin to address the many important questions about the climatic record of subtropical South America during the Holocene and latest Pleistocene. Lake Titicaca is one of the most important climatic archives in South America. The recovery and preliminary analysis of the proposed cores will provide unique, well-calibrated paleoclimatic records of wide-spread significance.