About this Research Topic
Information on parameters like global ice volume or nutrient availability is critical for developing and testing models of climate and environmental conditions in the past few thousand years. However, reliable measurements of such parameters only go back about a century and, before the advent of satellites, were sparsely distributed across the planet. Instrumental records can be extended through the use of geochemical proxies in well-dated carbonate deposits, for example, Sr/Ca ratios in coral aragonite cores as a proxy for sea surface temperature. Due to ongoing advances in analytical and micro-sampling techniques, these proxies now comprise a multitude of elemental ratios, isotopic systems, and redox couples incorporated in carbonate minerals precipitated by numerous organisms and processes.
Novel geochemical proxies in carbonate mineral records are being developed by scientists from an increasingly broad spectrum of fields and applied to an ever-growing number of environmental systems and questions, using a wide variety of advanced analytical instruments and methods. Concurrently, these developments are leading to new insights that enable established proxies to be reevaluated and improved. The time is right for a Research Topic that brings these experts together and helps them push their efforts forward by comparing notes, reviewing the present state of the science, and highlighting outstanding problems or controversies.
Temporally resolved carbonate mineral records, both biogenic like corals, mollusk shells, and stromatolites, or authigenic like speleothems and oölite deposits provide unique opportunities for the development and application of geochemical proxies for a wide range of environmental parameters.
For this Research Topic, we invite papers describing the development and/or use of new proxies as well as novel applications of existing proxies that assess variations of parameters such as temperature, salinity, pH, productivity, redox state, trade wind strength etc. in time and space, in either marine or freshwater systems. Proxies should be of a geochemical nature including, for example, elemental ratios, isotopic ratios, organic markers, or particle layers. Investigations that focus on proxy formation, analysis, and interpretation, or new insights into the use of established proxies are particularly encouraged, but more general paleo-environmental studies based on carbonate record proxies are also acceptable.
Novel geochemical proxies in carbonate mineral records are being developed by scientists from an increasingly broad spectrum of fields and applied to an ever-growing number of environmental systems and questions, using a wide variety of advanced analytical instruments and methods. Concurrently, these developments are leading to new insights that enable established proxies to be reevaluated and improved. The time is right for a Research Topic that brings these experts together and helps them push their efforts forward by comparing notes, reviewing the present state of the science, and highlighting outstanding problems or controversies.
Temporally resolved carbonate mineral records, both biogenic like corals, mollusk shells, and stromatolites, or authigenic like speleothems and oölite deposits provide unique opportunities for the development and application of geochemical proxies for a wide range of environmental parameters.
For this Research Topic, we invite papers describing the development and/or use of new proxies as well as novel applications of existing proxies that assess variations of parameters such as temperature, salinity, pH, productivity, redox state, trade wind strength etc. in time and space, in either marine or freshwater systems. Proxies should be of a geochemical nature including, for example, elemental ratios, isotopic ratios, organic markers, or particle layers. Investigations that focus on proxy formation, analysis, and interpretation, or new insights into the use of established proxies are particularly encouraged, but more general paleo-environmental studies based on carbonate record proxies are also acceptable.
Keywords: Carbonate Records, Geochemical Proxy, Coral, Stromatolite, Ooid Deposit, Speleothem, Paleoclimate
Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.
