RELATIVE GEOMAGNETIC-FIELD INTENSITY AND REVERSALS FOR THE LAST 1.8 MY FROM A CENTRAL EQUATORIAL PACIFIC CORE

We have made a new analysis of core KK78O30 from the central equatoria l Pacific. This core has recorded the last 4 reversals. Mineral-magnet ic analysis establishes that these sediments meet the current criteria for reliable relative paleointensity determinations. Normalisation wi th ARM, IRM and chi yields very similar results. There is no evidence for a ''saw-tooth'' pattern such as the one obtained by Valet and Meyn adier [1993] and Meynadier et al. [1994] for the last 4 million years. Rather, the average field intensity record appears to display more or less symmetric peaks and troughs, superposed to a broad high between reversals.