Jf. Adkins et Ea. Boyle, CHANGING ATMOSPHERIC DELTA-C-14 AND THE RECORD OF DEEP-WATER PALEOVENTILATION AGES, Paleoceanography, 12(3), 1997, pp. 337-344
We propose a new calculation method to better estimate the deep water
ventilation age from benthic-planktonic foraminifera C-14 ages. Our st
udy is motivated by the fact that changes in atmospheric Delta(14)C th
rough time can cause contemporary benthic and planktonic foraminifera
to have different initial Delta(14) values. This effect can cause spur
ious ventilation age changes to be interpreted from the geologic data.
Using a new calculation method, C-14 projection ages, we recalculate
the data from the Pacific Ocean. Contrary to previous results, we find
that the Pacific intermediate and deep waters were about 600 years ol
der than today at the last glacial maximum. In addition, there are pos
sible signals of ventilation age change prior to ice sheet melting and
at the Younger Dryas. However, the data are still too sparse to const
rain these ventilation transients.