GEOCHEMICAL SIGNALS IN PALEOGENE PENGUINS FROM SEYMOUR ISLAND (ISLA MARAMBIO), ANTARCTIC PENINSULA

• Published in: Publicación Electrónica de la Asociación Paleontológica Argentina
• Main Authors: Leandro Martín Pérez, Carolina Acosta Hospitaleche, Lucía Elena Gómez-Peral, Alejandro Gómez Dacal, Marcelo Alfredo Reguero, Daniel Gustavo Poiré, Claudia Ernestina Cavarozzi
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English; Spanish
• Published: Asociación Paleontológica Argentina 2023
• Subjects: Sphenisciformes; ICP-MS analysis; fossil-diagenesis; taphonomy; Weddell sea; Antarctica; Fossil man. Human paleontology; GN282-286.7; Paleontology; QE701-760; Antarctic; The Antarctic; Antarctic Peninsula; Weddell Sea; Drake Passage; Weddell; Seymour; Seymour Island; Marambio; isla Marambio; Antarc*
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.5710/PEAPA.14.11.2022.443; https://doaj.org/article/95c3ce934299450b8960e93a9cb12e0e

Trace elements, particularly rare earth elements (REE), are widely used as proxies to reconstruct paleoenvironmental and taphonomic conditions. We traced these elements in fossil penguin bones collected along the Paleogene sequence exposed in Seymour Island (=Isla Marambio) to test them as indicators of the tectonic changes to which this region was exposed. The results indicated the contents of REE in thirteen samples of the analyzed bone tissues. The negative europium anomaly in the samples from Bartonian and Priabonian beds reflects regional events. This signal coincides in time with the opening of the Drake Passage, and with the tectonic changes that occurred between the end of the Eocene and the beginning of the Oligocene, between the western margin of South America and the Antarctic Peninsula.