IODP Drilling of the “Shackleton Sites” on the Iberian Margin: A Plio-Pleistocene Marine Reference Section of Millennial-Scale Climate Change

• Published in: Scientific Drilling
• Main Authors: Henrique Duarte, Luis Batista, Gabriella Carrara, Fatima Abrantes, David Hodell
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Copernicus Publications 2010
• Subjects: Iberian Margin; Geology; QE1-996.5; Greenland; Shackleton; Greenland ice cores; ice core
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.2204/iodp.sd.9.10.2010; https://doaj.org/article/e46861fba2624f4b9c1f7dc7f227e761

Few marine sediment cores have played such a pivotal role in paleoclimate research as those recovered from the Portuguese Margin, including MD95-2039 to MD95-2042 (hereafter referred to as the “Shackleton sites”) (Fig. 1). These cores preserve a high-fidelity record of millennial-scale climate variability for the last several glacial cycles and can be readily correlated to Greenland ice cores. Moreover, the narrow continental shelf and proximity of the Tagus River results in rapid delivery of terrestrial material to the deep-sea environment, thereby permitting correlation of marine and ice-core records to European terrestrial sequences. Few places exist in the world’s ocean where such marine-ice-terrestrial linkages are possible. Consequently, the Iberian Margin cores have become de facto reference sections for the study of abrupt climate change.