Holocene Meltwater Variations Recorded in Antarctic Coastal Marine Benthic Assemblages

• Main Author: Berkman, Paul A.
• Other Authors: OHIO STATE UNIV COLUMBUS
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1992
• Subjects: Geography; Snow; Ice and Permafrost; Hydrology; Limnology and Potamology; *CLIMATE; *ANTARCTIC REGIONS; *POLAR REGIONS; ALTITUDE; BEACHES; ECOLOGY; ENVIRONMENTS; FOSSILS; GEOLOGIC AGE DETERMINATION; GRADIENTS; ICE; INPUT; OCEANS; RECORDS; RESPONSE; SEA LEVEL; SHEETS; SIGNATURES; SOUND; SUMMER; TIME; SYMPOSIA; WATER; GLACIERS; Component Reports; *Holocene meltwater variations; *Coastal marine benthic assemblages; Antarctic; Fairbanks; McMurdo Sound; Antarc*; Antarctica; glaciers; Ice; permafrost; Alaska
• Online Access: http://www.dtic.mil/docs/citations/ADP007323; http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?&verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADP007323

Climate changes can influence the input of meltwater from the polar ice sheets. In Antarctica, signatures of meltwater input during the Holocene may be recorded in the benthic fossils which exist at similar altitudes above sea level in emerged beaches around the continent Interpreting the fossils as meltwater proxy records would be enhanced by understanding the modern ecology of the species in adjacent marine environments. Characteristics of an extant scallop assemblage in West McMurdo Sound, Antarctica, have been evaluated across a summer meltwater gradient to provide examples of meltwater records that may be contained in proximal scallop fossils. Integrating environmental proxies from coastal benthic assemblages around Antarctica, over ecological and geological time scales, is a necessary step in evaluating the marginal responses of the ice sheets to climate changes during the Holocene. This article is from 'Proceedings of the International Conference on the Role of the Polar Regions in Global Change Held in Fairbanks, Alaska on 11-15 June 990. Volume 2', AD-A253 028, p440-449. See also Volume 1, AD-A253 027.