Clumped isotope composition of modern cold-water corals ...

• Main Authors: Spooner, Peter, Thiagarajan, Nivedita, Guo, Weifu, Hendry, Katherine, Leng, Melanie, Robinson, Laura, Rosenheim, Brad
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: Interdisciplinary Earth Data Alliance (IEDA) 2017
• Subjects: Regional Continents, Oceans; ChemistryRock; Sample/Collection Description; Biosphere; Geochemistry; FOS Earth and related environmental sciences; Marine Geoscience; Southern Ocean; clumped isotope; cold-water corals; Drake Passage; tropical Atlantic Ocean
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.1594/ieda/100704; https://ecl.earthchem.org/view.php?id=1088

The carbonate clumped isotope thermometer is a promising tool for determining past ocean temperatures. It is based on the temperature dependence of rare isotopes ‘clumping’ into the same carbonate ion group in the carbonate mineral lattice. The extent of this clumping effect is independent of the isotope composition of the water from which carbonate precipitates, providing unique advantages over many other paleotemperature proxies. Existing calibrations of this thermometer in cold- water and warm-water corals suggest clumped isotope ‘vital effects’ are negligible in cold-water corals but may be significant in warm-water corals. Here, we test the calibration of the carbonate clumped isotope thermometer in cold-water corals with a recently collected and well characterised sample set spanning a range of coral genera (Balanophyllia, Caryophyllia, Dasmosmilia, Desmophyllum, Enallopsammia and Javania). The clumped isotope compositions (D47) of these corals exhibit systematic dependences on their growth ... : Spooner, Peter T.; Guo, Weifu; Robinson, Laura F.; Thiagarajan, Nivedita; Hendry, Katherine R.; Rosenheim, Brad E.; Leng, Melanie J. (2016) "Clumped isotope composition of cold-water corals: A role for vital effects?", Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, 79, 123-141. doi:10.1016/j.gca.2016.01.023 ...