Facilities Support: Amino Acid Geochronology Laboratory

1234413 kaufman这项设施支持拨款为北亚利桑那大学的氨基酸地质年代学实验室（AAGL）提供了为期四年的逐步取消的支持。该设施自2004年以来一直得到EAR/IF的支持。由于经验丰富的实验室技术人员持续的EAR/IF部分支持，该设施每年为内部和外部用户支持超过5,000个样品分析。生物体死亡后氨基酸的外消旋化与死亡后经过的时间和反应环境的温度成正比。因此，AA地学提供了一种工具来确定化石遗骸的年代，从而可以推断环境的温度历史，或者如果样品的年龄是独立确定的（例如，放射性碳测年），则可以用于古温度学。样品分析快速、廉价，对样本量的要求也很低，例如可以测定单个微化石的年代。AAGL的历史包括广泛使用该设施进行一系列地球科学调查和应用，包括：深海沉积物年代学和底水古温学，化石组合的古生物平均时间及其在历史生态学和层序地层学、海平面波动、第四纪构造史、冰川地质、陆相露头（河流、风成和湖泊沉积物）和湖核年代学、岛屿陆螺演化中的应用。AAGL的数据将继续保存在一个国家中心，即世界古气候学数据中心。通过逐步提高分析费用，该设施最终将在2016财年实现自给自足

1234413 KaufmanThis Facility Support grant provides for four years of gradually phased out support for the The Amino Acid Geochronology Laboratory (AAGL) at Northern Arizona University. This facility has been supported by EAR/IF since 2004. The facility supports in excess of 5,000 sample analyses per year for in house and external users as the result of continued EAR/IF partial support of an experienced lab technician. Racemization of amino acids following the death of an organism is proportional to time elapsed since death and the temperature of the reaction environment. AA geochonology therefore provides a tool to date fossil remains for which the temperature history of the environment can be inferred or for paleothermometry if the age of the sample is determined independently (e.g., radiocarbon dating). Sample analysis is rapid and inexpensive and sample size requirements are minimal, allowing for dating of individual microfossils, for example. The history of AAGL includes broad use of the facility for a range of geoscience inquiries and applications including: deep-sea sediment chronology and bottomwater paleothermometry, paleontological time-averaging of fossil assemblages with applications to historical ecology and sequence stratigraphy, sea-level fluctuations, Quaternary tectonic history, glacial geology, terrestrial outcrop (fluvial, eolian, and lacustrine sediments) and lake-core chronostratigraphy, and island land-snail evolution. AAGL data will continue to be archived at a national center, the World Data Center for Paleoclimatology. The Facility will ultimately become self supporting by FY 2016 via gradually higher analytical charges.***