INNOVATIONS IN FELDSPAR LUMINESCENCE DATING AND APPLICATION TO PALEOCLIMATOLOGICAL STUDIES

我们的星球正面临其历史的一个关键部分，因为现代社会需要实施适应战略，以适应迅速变化的地表环境，以应对全球变暖。地质记录包含沉积档案，可用来解释自然环境对气候变化的弹性或敏感性。这项研究计划的主要目标是开发长石发光测年领域的新方法，以评估对气候敏感的地质和考古沉积档案的年代学。 科学的方法是重点研究沉积物中单个长石颗粒的发光特性。由于长石的固态物理性质，长石的发光测年应适用于最近50万年。因此，这种方法可以探测到比放射性碳深10倍的地质时代，比目前石英光激发发光(OSL)的年龄范围深5倍以上。测量长石发光的常规技术是使用红外光子来激发发光，因此被称为IRSL。在这项研究计划中，我们建议跟进一种新的方法，即只从不褪色的长石中测定沉积物的年龄。随着单颗粒阅读器中新仪器的开发，这项新技术现已成为可能，其中大多数仪器现已在蒙特雷亚尔实验室获得，这是由于CFI向UQAM地质年代学小组提供了一大笔资金。 这项研究的新颖性及其最重要的意义在于为参与全球变化科学的自然科学界提供了一个新的年表工具。二十年来，我的研究小组和蒙特雷亚尔实验室一直处于IRSL测年研究领域的前沿。这种新的约会技术的发展将确保加拿大保持这种国际领导地位。

Our planet is facing a critical part of its history as modern societies need to implement adaptation strategies to rapidly changing surface environments in response to global warming. The geological record contains sedimentary archives that can be used to interpret the resilience or sensitivity of physical environments to climate change. The main objective of this research program is therein to develop new methodologies in the field of feldspar luminescence dating for assessing the chronology of climate-sensitive geological and archaeological sedimentary archives. The scientific approach is to focus on the luminescence properties of single feldspar grains in sediments. Due to the nature of its solid-state physics, luminescence dating of feldspar shall be applicable to the last 500 000 years. This method can therefore probe 10 times deeper into geological time than radiocarbon and more than 5 times the current age range of quartz optically-stimulated luminescence (OSL). The routine technology for measuring luminescence in feldspar is to use infrared photons to stimulate luminescence, hence the term IRSL. In this research program, we propose to follow up on a novel approach that consists in dating sediments from only unfading feldspars. This novel technology is now possible following the development of new instrumentation in single grain readers, most of these are now available in the Montréal laboratory as a result of a major CFI funding to the UQAM geochronology group. The novelty of this research and its upmost significance is in providing access to a new chronological tool for the natural sciences community involved in the science of Global Changes. My research group and the Montréal laboratory have been at the forefront of the IRSL dating research field for two decades. The development of this new dating technology shall insure this international leadership remains in Canada.