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Science 21 July 1978:
Vol. 201. no. 4352, pp. 252 - 254
DOI: 10.1126/science.201.4352.252
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Articles

Periodic Freshwater Flooding and Stagnation of the Eastern Mediterranean Sea During the Late Quaternary

DOUGLAS F. WILLIAMS 1, ROBERT C. THUNELL 2, and JAMES P. KENNETT 2

1 Department of Geology and Belle W. Baruch Institute for Marine Biology and Coastal Research, University of South Carolina, Columbia 29208
2 Graduate School of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island, Kingston 02881

Major negative oxygen isotopic anomalies in planktonic foraminifera are associated with deep-sea anoxic mud layers (sapropels) deposited 9000 and 80,000 years ago in the eastern Mediterranean. The isotopic depletion in surface-dwelling foraminifera is significantly greater than in mesopelagic foraminifera. This difference in isotopic response suggests that surface-water salinities were drastically reduced during times of sapropel formation, possibly as the result of meltwater runoff from the Fennoscandian ice sheet into the eastern Mediterranean by way of the Black and Aegean seas.

Submitted on November 21, 1977
Revised on March 28, 1978


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Palaeoceanography and numerical modelling: the Mediterranean Sea at times of sapropel formation.
E. J. Rohling, S. De Rijk, P. G. Myers, and K. Haines (2000)
Geological Society, London, Special Publications 181, 135-149
   Abstract »    PDF »
Meltwater influences and palaeocirculation changes in the North Atlantic during the last glacial termination.
D. F. Williams and R. N. Fillon (1986)
Geological Society, London, Special Publications 21, 175-180
   Abstract »    PDF »
Models for the deposition of Mesozoic-Cenozoic fine-grained organic-carbon-rich sediment in the deep sea.
M. A. Arthur, W. E. Dean, and D. A. V. Stow (1984)
Geological Society, London, Special Publications 15, 527-560
   Abstract »    PDF »
Sapropelic layers in the NW Aegean Sea.
A. Cramp, M. B. Collins, S. J. Wakefield, and F. T. Banner (1984)
Geological Society, London, Special Publications 17, 807-813
   Abstract »    PDF »


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