Collaborative Research: Morphology and Timing of the Reunion/Huckleberry Ridge Event(s)

合作研究：团聚/哈克贝利岭事件的形态和时间安排

• 批准号: 0943584
• 负责人: Bradley Singer
• 金额: $ 8.4万
• 依托单位: University of Wisconsin-Madison
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2010-09-15 至 2012-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0943584&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Morphology; Timing; Reunion

The strength of the Earth's magnetic field is important to modern society because it protects Earth and its communication satellites from harmful levels of solar radiation. During periods when the Earth's relative magnetic field strength drops (e.g., during solar flares), increased amounts of solar radiation are allowed to penetrate further into the upper atmosphere causing damage to satellites and interfering with shortwave radio communication. For this reason, it is important to understand the natural short-term variability of the Earth's magnetic field. Records of past geomagnetic field behavior are well-preserved by magnetic minerals within volcanic and sedimentary rocks. Although scientists have long used these records to study the long-term history of magnetic polarity reversals, records of more short-lived geomagnetic instabilities are poorly resolved in time, typically incomplete, and lacking in detail. Developing enhanced, global records with precise age control is essential to identifying common trends during and leading to magnetic field instability.The research supported by this grant aims to produce the most globally complete record of unstable geomagnetic field behavior to date. We plan to integrate magnetic records collected from volcanic and sedimentary rocks from around the world in order to compile a chronologically calibrated, continuous full-vector record of geomagnetic field behavior during the Réunion geomagnetic event, which occurred roughly two million years ago. This research will allow us to address several fundamental questions: How quickly to geomagnetic instabilities manifest themselves? Do geomagnetic instabilities occur synchronously around the world, or do they affect some geographic regions longer and more severely than others? How weak is the Earth's magnetic field during an instability event? In addition to helping resolve these questions, the data generated during this research will be key to future efforts aimed at modeling the complete behavior of the Earth?s magnetic field and will refine the magnetostratigraphy of the Lower Quaternary, thereby improving the correlation of strata on a global scale.

地球磁场的强度对现代社会很重要，因为它可以保护地球及其通信卫星免受有害的太阳辐射。 在地球相对磁场强度下降期间（例如，太阳耀斑期间），更多的太阳辐射会进一步渗透到高层大气中，从而导致卫星损坏并干扰短波无线电通信。 因此，了解地球磁场的自然短期变化非常重要。 火山岩和沉积岩中的磁性矿物完好地保存了过去地磁场行为的记录。 尽管科学家长期以来一直利用这些记录来研究磁极性反转的长期历史，但更短暂的地磁不稳定性的记录很难及时解决，通常不完整且缺乏细节。 开发具有精确年龄控制的增强型全球记录对于识别磁场不稳定期间和导致磁场不稳定的共同趋势至关重要。这笔赠款支持的研究旨在生成迄今为止全球最完整的不稳定地磁场行为记录。 我们计划整合从世界各地的火山和沉积岩中收集的磁记录，以编制按时间顺序校准的、连续的全矢量记录，记录大约两百万年前发生的留尼汪地磁事件期间的地磁场行为。 这项研究将使我们能够解决几个基本问​​题：地磁不稳定性表现出来的速度有多快？地磁不稳定性是否在世界各地同时发生，或者它们对某些地理区域的影响是否比其他地理区域更长、更严重？不稳定事件期间地球磁场有多弱？ 除了帮助解决这些问题之外，这项研究期间生成的数据对于未来模拟地球磁场完整行为的努力至关重要，并将完善下第四纪的磁性地层学，从而改善全球范围内地层的相关性。