INTOMESS: Quantification of salinity and temperature changes accompanying the way INTO the Mediterranean MESSinian Salinity Crisis

自发现以来，墨西尼亚盐度危机（MSC; 5.97 - 5.33 Ma）成为大陆范围内剧烈水文变化的典型，提供了地球历史上最近和最不受干扰的剧烈水收支突变的长期记录。地中海环流是大西洋和地中海盆地之间的联系发生改变的结果，导致海平面剧烈波动，生物生态系统的总周转受到高盐水体发展的支配，并在盆地底部沉积了100万立方米的蒸发岩单元。尽管进行了多年的研究，但我们仍然面临着重要的知识空白，特别是在通往地中海顶极的水文动力学方面。解决方案的关键可以在地中海盆地的盐度历史中找到：生物标志物分析使我们今天能够通过使用UK ' 37和TEX86代理来获得海面温度估计。将这些海面温度估计与来自相同地层水平的δ18Oforam数据相结合，可以量化海面盐度变化，从而为导致MSC危机的盆地水演变提供信息。详细的盐度重建，最终将有助于破译墨西尼亚盐度变化是突然发生还是逐渐发生，以及岁差周期是否在调节墨西尼亚盐度变化中起重要作用，直到MSC开始。本提案的指导关键问题将是：地中海海潮开始时，地中海表面盐度是否已经很高，导致从5.97 Ma开始的盐沉积？在墨西尼亚时期，整个地中海的盐度变化是准伴随的吗？露头的岩性差异是由盐度变化决定的，还是由地中海海水柱的不同氧合作用决定的？总的来说，这些问题将使我们能够确定墨西尼亚地中海的盐度变化是否发生在由进动调节的可逆步骤中，或者这些变化是否受到大西洋门户的接近和限制的控制，从而将气候影响与构造影响分开。

Since its discovery, the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC; 5.97 – 5.33 Ma) became the archetype of dramatic hydrologic change on an intracontinental scale providing the most recent and least disturbed long-term record of abrupt and severe water budget change in Earth’s history. The MSC was the result of altering the connections between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean basin resulting in dramatic sea level fluctuations, total turnover of bio-ecosystems governed by the development of hypersaline water bodies and deposition of >1000 m evaporite units on the basin floor. Despite many years of research, we still face important knowledge gaps, in particular concerning the hydrological dynamics en route to the MSC climax. A key to the solution can be found in the salinity history of the mediterranean bansin: Biomarker analytics allow us today to obtain sea surface temperature estimates by using the UK’37 and TEX86 proxies. Combining these sea surface temperature estimates with δ18Oforam data from the same stratigraphic levels then permits to quantify sea surface salinity changes that in turn inform about basin water evolution leading into the MSC crisis. Detailed salinity reconstructions, ultimately, will help deciphering if Messinian salinity change occured suddenly or in a gradual fashion and if precessional cyclicity was important in modulating the salinity variations during the Messinian until the onset of the MSC. Guiding key questions of this proposal will be: Was Mediterranean sea surface salinity already very high at the onset of the MSC, leading to the deposition of salts starting at 5.97 Ma? Are the salinity changes quasi-concomitant in the entire Mediterranean during the Messinian? Are the lithological differences expressed in the outcrops determined by salinity changes or result from diffrent oxygenation of the Mediterranean Sea water column? Collectively, these questions will allow us to identify if the salinity changes in the Messinian Mediterranean occurred in reversible steps modulated by precession or if these changes were controlled by the proximity to and restrictedness of the Atlantic gateway hence separating climatic from tectonic effects.