Preface

**Data (on Rock-Forming and Sulphide Minerals), Duration and**

T. Bayanova, F. Mitrofanov, P. Serov, L. Nerovich, N. Yekimova, E.

**Mineralization 143**

**VI** Contents

Nitkina and I. Kamensky

**"There is no history without a chronology"** , the white rabbit in Alice in Wonder‐ land is supposed to have said. And, indeed, this is a very wise saying. Chronology is the time ordering by which events get a position in time so that an evolutionary history becomes recordable in memory, picture or writing.

The successive growth of a crystal, a speleothem or a coral implies the successive adding of time slices. When dated, we get a chronological order of the growth his‐ tory.

The adding of sediments implies the successive building up of a stratigraphy where each individual time slice represents a point in the growing history over time. By comparison with modern processes, one might obtain a rough time esti‐ mate of how much is required for the formation of a certain time unit. And this was the first geochronological method; i.e. the wish of decoding the age hidden in various sedimentary units. Charles Lyell is usually considered to be the "father of stratigraphy". The study of stratigraphy is the core of the geological science. Al‐ ready in the late 19th century, it was estimated that the base of the Cambrian Era and the onset of shell-bearing fossils must have an age in the order of 500 million years, an age arrived at by adding up estimated of the time of deposition of the sequence of stratigraphic units from the present back to the base of the Cambrian.

The application radiometric dating methods started in 1907 [1] and has gone through a remarkable evolution throughout the 20th century. In radiometric dating, the radioactive decay and transformation of one nuclide (i.e. isotope of a particular element) into another nuclide is used to establish absolute age determinations. By now there are several different methods; e.g. uranium-led, samarium-neodymium, potassium-argon, rubidium-strontium, uranium-thorium, radiocarbon, fission track, chlorine-36, luminescence.

scriptions and their applications in case studies, we hope to reach the interest of

1. Boltwood, B. (1907). The Ultimate Disintegration Products of the Radio-active Elements. Part II. The disintegration products of uranium, *American Journal of Sci‐*

2. Wilde S.A., Valley J.W., Peck W.H. & Graham C.M. (2001). Evidence from detri‐ tal zircons for the existence of continental crust and oceans on the Earth 4.4 Gyr

3. Mörner, N.-A. (2003). *Paleoseismicity of Sweden – a novel paradigm* . A contribution to INQUA from its Sub-commission on Paleoseismology, Reno 2003, 320 pp., P&G-

4. EPICA Community Members (2004). Eight glacial cycles from an Antarctic ice

5. Rasmussen, S.O. & 15 others, (2006). A new Greenland ice core chronology for the last glacial termination, *J. Geophys. Res* ., 111, D06102. DOI:

6. Arnold, J. R. & Libby, W. F. (1949). Age determination by radiocarbon content:

7. Mörner, N.-A., Tattersall, R. and Solheim, J.-E. (2013). Preface: Pattern in solar variability, their planetary origin and terrestrial impacts, *Pattern Recogn. Physics* , 1,

**Nils-Axel Mörner**

Sweden

Preface IX

Paleogeophysics & Geodynamics

scientist in their own research as well as teachers and students in education.

Stockholm, May 2014

*ence.* 23, 77–88. doi:10.2475/ajs.s4-23.134.78.

print, Stockholm. ISBN-91-631-4072-1.

samples of known age, *Science* ,, 110, 678-680.

core, *Nature* , 429, 623-628.

10.1029/2005JD006079

Check with

203-204.

ago, *Nature* , 409, 175–178. doi:10.1038/35051550.

**Figure 1.** The Earth's time spiral with the chronological position of the six chapters marked.

The Earth was born as a planet about 4.5 billion years ago (Fig. 1). Whilst the chro‐ nology of the Phanerozoic Era is known in great details, it is only rudimentary known for older periods. Quite remarkably, a zircon crystal has been found in the Jack Hills formation in Australia, which has a primary age of 4.4 GA [2]. This im‐ plies that it has been a part of Earth's evolutionary history almost right from the beginning (Fig. 1 and image on the cover).

As a counterpart to the long Jack Hills zircon age, we have, on the cover, given a record of seasonal resolution: a Swedish clay varve, which in its autumn unit re‐ cords a huge earthquake that shock southern Sweden in varve 10,430 BP [3].

Ice cores provide long [4] and detailed [5] chronological records, which in combi‐ nation with analyses of its contents of elements and isotopes provide excellent re‐ cords of the Late Quaternary climatic evolution [5].

The radiocarbon dating method [6] surely meant a revolution in the chronological ordering in archaeology and Late Quaternary geology. It was soon realized, how‐ ever, that because the 14C content in the atmosphere – as a function of variations of the magnetic shielding capacity – had changed significantly through time. There‐ fore, a radiocarbon age determination must be calibrated to obtain and absolute age. The remarkable thing, however, is that we by that get a record of the changes in the Earth's geomagnetic field strength as a function of the interaction between the Solar Wind (heliomagnetism) and the Earth's own geomagnetic field. This in its turn opens for the decoding of planetary-solar-terrestrial interaction [7].

In this book some of the most basic dating methods are presented in combination with their practical application in the field and in the laboratory. The time win‐ dows addresses are given in Fig. 1. With this mixing of strict methodological de‐ scriptions and their applications in case studies, we hope to reach the interest of scientist in their own research as well as teachers and students in education.

Stockholm, May 2014

**Figure 1.** The Earth's time spiral with the chronological position of the six chapters marked.

beginning (Fig. 1 and image on the cover).

VIII Preface

cords of the Late Quaternary climatic evolution [5].

The Earth was born as a planet about 4.5 billion years ago (Fig. 1). Whilst the chro‐ nology of the Phanerozoic Era is known in great details, it is only rudimentary known for older periods. Quite remarkably, a zircon crystal has been found in the Jack Hills formation in Australia, which has a primary age of 4.4 GA [2]. This im‐ plies that it has been a part of Earth's evolutionary history almost right from the

As a counterpart to the long Jack Hills zircon age, we have, on the cover, given a record of seasonal resolution: a Swedish clay varve, which in its autumn unit re‐

Ice cores provide long [4] and detailed [5] chronological records, which in combi‐ nation with analyses of its contents of elements and isotopes provide excellent re‐

The radiocarbon dating method [6] surely meant a revolution in the chronological ordering in archaeology and Late Quaternary geology. It was soon realized, how‐ ever, that because the 14C content in the atmosphere – as a function of variations of the magnetic shielding capacity – had changed significantly through time. There‐ fore, a radiocarbon age determination must be calibrated to obtain and absolute age. The remarkable thing, however, is that we by that get a record of the changes in the Earth's geomagnetic field strength as a function of the interaction between the Solar Wind (heliomagnetism) and the Earth's own geomagnetic field. This in its

In this book some of the most basic dating methods are presented in combination with their practical application in the field and in the laboratory. The time win‐ dows addresses are given in Fig. 1. With this mixing of strict methodological de‐

cords a huge earthquake that shock southern Sweden in varve 10,430 BP [3].

turn opens for the decoding of planetary-solar-terrestrial interaction [7].

**Nils-Axel Mörner** Paleogeophysics & Geodynamics Sweden

1. Boltwood, B. (1907). The Ultimate Disintegration Products of the Radio-active Elements. Part II. The disintegration products of uranium, *American Journal of Sci‐ ence.* 23, 77–88. doi:10.2475/ajs.s4-23.134.78.

2. Wilde S.A., Valley J.W., Peck W.H. & Graham C.M. (2001). Evidence from detri‐ tal zircons for the existence of continental crust and oceans on the Earth 4.4 Gyr ago, *Nature* , 409, 175–178. doi:10.1038/35051550.

3. Mörner, N.-A. (2003). *Paleoseismicity of Sweden – a novel paradigm* . A contribution to INQUA from its Sub-commission on Paleoseismology, Reno 2003, 320 pp., P&Gprint, Stockholm. ISBN-91-631-4072-1.

4. EPICA Community Members (2004). Eight glacial cycles from an Antarctic ice core, *Nature* , 429, 623-628.

5. Rasmussen, S.O. & 15 others, (2006). A new Greenland ice core chronology for the last glacial termination, *J. Geophys. Res* ., 111, D06102. DOI: 10.1029/2005JD006079

6. Arnold, J. R. & Libby, W. F. (1949). Age determination by radiocarbon content: Check with

samples of known age, *Science* ,, 110, 678-680.

7. Mörner, N.-A., Tattersall, R. and Solheim, J.-E. (2013). Preface: Pattern in solar variability, their planetary origin and terrestrial impacts, *Pattern Recogn. Physics* , 1, 203-204.

**Section 1**

**The Quaternary**

**Section 1**

## **The Quaternary**

**Chapter 1**

**Quaternary Geochronology Using Accelerator Mass**

**at the TONO Geoscience Center**

Akihiro Matsubara, Yoko Saito-Kokubu, Akimitsu Nishizawa, Masayasu Miyake,

Additional information is available at the end of the chapter

Tsuneari Ishimaru and Koji Umeda

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/58549

**1. Introduction**

**1.1. Background**

**Spectrometry (AMS) – Current Status of the AMS System**

The Tono Geoscience Center (TGC) of the Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) has been conducting research into the long term (several million years) stability of underground environments, in order to provide the scientific knowledge needed to ensure safety and reliability for the geological disposal of high-level radioactive waste [1–3]. The time scale for occurrence of the relevant geoscientific activities, as shown in Figure 1, i.e., earthquake/fault and volcanic activities, behavior of groundwater flow, uplift/subsidence and erosion of the ground surface, and so on, corresponds well to the duration of the Quaternary Period geology. Geochronology of the Quaternary Period has been strongly enhanced by measurement of terrestrial *in situ* cosmogenic radionuclides, such as 10Be, 14C, 26Al, and 36Cl, produced by secondary cosmic rays (e.g., neutron, muon) which are generated by interaction between the atmosphere of earth and primary cosmic rays that originate from the sun and galactic systems.

Applications of accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) using those rare radionuclides for geological studies have been summarized by various authors [4–7]. It is a well-known fact that 14C has been widely utilized in several disciplines, including geology, environmental science, archaeology, and biomedicine. With regard to research into underground geological disposal of waste, radiocarbon dating of organic samples (e.g., bulk organic, humic acid, and humin fractions) taken from faults provide an historical archive of typical conventional applications

> © 2014 The Author(s). Licensee InTech. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
