Obtaining a high-latitude Southern Hemisphere Cretaceous record: Naturaliste Plateau and Mentelle Basin Virtual Site Survey

了解极地和热带气候动态之间的联系机制、反馈和时间关系，对于重建过去的快速气候变化，从而改进对未来的预测具有根本重要性。越来越多的科学证据表明，白垩纪中期的超级温室气候可能被一系列短暂的冰川中断。这样的事件会提供这种数据。然而，显然缺乏来自高纬度南半球海洋的岩心，这些可能的冰川的证据将被最好地保存下来。唯一另一个认可的IODP提议是在高纬度南半球钻探白垩纪，主要是为了调查一个受限制的盆地，不会提供了解对全球气候影响所需的开放海洋信息。在本提案中，我们将详细研究现有的地震数据从Naturaliste高原和Mentelle盆地近海西澳大利亚州，在白垩纪，暴露于开放的海洋环流的澳大利亚/南极洲大陆边缘。这项工作的结果将创建Naturaliste高原和Mentelle盆地地质演化的详细地图，特别强调白垩纪时期。这些地图将用于确定钻探白垩纪沉积物的最佳地点，并将成为IODP完整提案的基础。该项目的结果还将用于支持ICDP的一项建议，即在珀斯盆地南部钻探一个时间相当（和更深）的浅海和大陆层序，从而提供一个陆地-盆地横断面和数据，有助于我们了解深时海洋-大气相互作用。

Understanding the mechanisms, feedbacks and time relationships that link climate dynamics between the polar regions and the tropics is of fundamental importance for reconstructing rapid climate change in the past, and hence improving predictions for the future. There is growing scientific evidence that the mid-Cretaceous super-greenhouse climate may have been interrupted by a series of short-lived glaciations. Such events would provide just this kind of data. However, there is a clear lack of drill core from high-latitude Southern Hemisphere oceans, where evidence of these possible glaciations will be best preserved. The only other exisiting IODP proposal to drill the Cretaceous in the high-latitude Southern Hemisphere is primarily structured to investigate a restricted basin and will not provide the required open ocean information necessary to understand effects on global climate. In this proposal we will examine in detail the existing seismic data from the Naturaliste Plateau and Mentelle Basin offshore Western Australia which, during the Cretaceous, was exposed to open ocean circulation on the Australia/Antarctica continental margin. The results of this work will create detailed maps of the geological evolution of the Naturaliste Plateau and Mentelle Basin, with particular emphasis on the Cretaceous interval. These maps will be used to determine the optimal site for drilling Cretaceous sediments and will form the basis for an IODP Full Proposal. The results from this project will also be used to support a proposal to the ICDP to drill a time-equivalent (and deeper) shallow marine and continental sequence in the southern Perth Basin, thus providing a land-basin transect and data contributing to our understanding of deep-time ocean-atmosphere interactions.