RADIOCARBON CHRONOLOGY OF THE DSDDP CORE AT THE DEEPEST FLOOR OF THE DEAD SEA

by Hiroyuki Kitagawa, Mordechai Stein, Steven L Goldstein, Toshio Nakamura, Boaz Lazar, and DSDDP Scientific Party. Radiocarbon 59(2), 2017, 383–394.(DOI: 10.1017/RDC.2016.120) [open access]

This study establishes the chronological framework of the sedimentary sequence deposited Dead Sea, ICDP 5017-1, Radiocarbon chronology during the past 50 ka at the deepest part of the Dead Sea (the ICDP 5017-1 site), which was recovered by the Dead Sea Deep Drilling Project (DSDDP) under the auspices of the International Continental Scientific Drilling Program (ICDP). The age-depth model is constructed using 38 14C dates of terrestrial plant remains in a composite 150-m-long profile, generated by anchoring 32 marker layers identified in five cores. The sedimentary records at the ICDP 5017-1 site fills gaps in those obtained from the exposed sections at the high margins of the lake, particularly in times of lake-level retreat, and allows for a high-resolution comparison between the lake’s margins and deepest floor.

(a) Age-depth model of the 5017-1 composite profile at the interval of 95.4% confidence level. (b) The sedimentation rate calculated from the age-depth model. The gray boxes mark uncertainties at the 95.4% confidence level.