Publication Date:
2013-05-21
Description:
Sedimentary rocks from Virginia through Florida record marine flooding during the mid-Pliocene. Several wave-cut scarps that at the time of deposition would have been horizontal are now draped over a warped surface with a maximum variation of 60 meters. We modeled dynamic topography by using mantle convection simulations that predict the amplitude and broad spatial distribution of this distortion. The results imply that dynamic topography and, to a lesser extent, glacial isostatic adjustment account for the current architecture of the coastal plain and proximal shelf. This confounds attempts to use regional stratigraphic relations as references for longer-term sea-level determinations. Inferences of Pliocene global sea-level heights or stability of Antarctic ice sheets therefore cannot be deciphered in the absence of an appropriate mantle dynamic reference frame.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Rowley, David B -- Forte, Alessandro M -- Moucha, Robert -- Mitrovica, Jerry X -- Simmons, Nathan A -- Grand, Stephen P -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 2013 Jun 28;340(6140):1560-3. doi: 10.1126/science.1229180. Epub 2013 May 16.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Department of the Geophysical Sciences, 5734 South Ellis Avenue, The University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637, USA. drowley@uchicago.edu〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23686342" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
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Chemistry and Pharmacology
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Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
