[Coral-List] New paper: 6, 000 year sea-level record in French Polynesia

[Nadine Hallmann]

Dear coral-listers, 

I am pleased to share our recent paper published open access in Nature Communications on a high-resolution reconstruction of relative sea-level changes over the last 6,000 years based on coral microatolls, which are the most accurate low-tide recorders.

"Ice volume and climate changes from a 6,000 year sea-level record in French Polynesia" by Hallmann, N., Camoin, G, Eisenhauer, A, Botella, A, Milne, G.A, Vella, C., Samankassou, E.,  Pothin, V., Dussouillez, P., Fleury, J., Fietzke, J.

Link to the article: http://rdcu.be/EZdU

Mid- to late-Holocene sea-level records from low-latitude regions serve as an important baseline of natural variability in sea level and global ice volume prior to the Anthropocene. Here we reconstruct a high-resolution sea-level curve encompassing the last 6,000 years based on a comprehensive study of coral microatolls, which are sensitive low-tide recorders. Our curve is the first based on microatolls from several islands in a single region and comprises a total of 82 sea-level index points. Assuming thermosteric contributions are negligible on millennial time scales, our results constrain global ice melting to be 1.5-2.5 m (sea-level equivalent) since ~5,500 years before present. The reconstructed curve includes isolated rapid events of several decimeters within a few centuries, one of which is most likely related to loss from the Antarctic ice sheet mass around 5,000 years before present. In contrast, the occurrence of large and flat microatolls indicates periods of significant sea-level stability lasting up to ~300 years.

Please contact us with any comments or questions.

Best regards,

Nadine

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Dr. Nadine Hallmann
Assistant Director of the ECORD Managing Agency 



CEREGE UMR 7330 CNRS
Europôle Méditerranéen de l’Arbois
Avenue Louis Philibert
BP 80
F-13545 Aix-en-Provence cedex 4
Phone: +33 4 42 97 15 47 
Cell phone: +33 6 21 40 54 96	  
Email: hallmann at cerege.fr
        ema at cerege.fr
www.ECORD.org
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