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| Version | Summary | Created by | Modification | Content Size | Created at | Operation |
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| 1 | Rita Xu | -- | 1421 | 2022-11-03 01:31:56 |
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Marine isotope stages (MIS), marine oxygen-isotope stages, or oxygen isotope stages (OIS), are alternating warm and cool periods in the Earth's paleoclimate, deduced from oxygen isotope data reflecting changes in temperature derived from data from deep sea core samples. Working backwards from the present, which is MIS 1 in the scale, stages with even numbers have high levels of oxygen-18 and represent cold glacial periods, while the odd-numbered stages are lows in the oxygen-18 figures, representing warm interglacial intervals. The data are derived from pollen and foraminifera (plankton) remains in drilled marine sediment cores, sapropels, and other data that reflect historic climate; these are called proxies. The MIS timescale was developed from the pioneering work of Cesare Emiliani in the 1950s, and is now widely used in archaeology and other fields to express dating in the Quaternary period (the last 2.6 million years), as well as providing the fullest and best data for that period for paleoclimatology or the study of the early climate of the Earth, representing "the standard to which we correlate other Quaternary climate records". Emiliani's work in turn depended on Harold Urey's prediction in a paper of 1947 that the ratio between oxygen-18 and oxygen-16 isotopes in calcite, the main chemical component of the shells and other hard parts of a wide range of marine organisms, should vary depending on the prevailing water temperature in which the calcite was formed. Over 100 stages have been identified, currently going back some 6 million years, and the scale may in future reach back up to 15 mya. Some stages, in particular MIS 5, are divided into sub-stages, such as "MIS 5a", with 5 a, c, and e being warm and b and d cold. A numeric system for referring to "horizons" (events rather than periods) may also be used, with for example MIS 5.5 representing the peak point of MIS 5e, and 5.51, 5.52 etc. representing the peaks and troughs of the record at a still more detailed level. For more recent periods, increasingly precise resolution of timing continues to be developed.
References
- Cronin, 120-121
- Wright, 431
- Andrews, 448
- Aitken & Stokes (1997), 12-13; Wright, 431-432
- Aitken & Stokes (1997), 10; Wright, 431
- SPECMAP on NASA website http://gcmd.nasa.gov/records/GCMD_EARTH_LAND_NGDC_PALEOCL_SPECMAP.html
- Cronin, 121-122, 121 quoted; PDF of paper Variations in the earth’s orbit: pacemaker of the ice ages (in Science), by Shackleton and others http://www.mantleplumes.org/WebDocuments/Hays1976.pdf
- "Version history of the Quaternary chronostratigraphical chart". The Subcommission on Quaternary Stratigraphy. 2011. https://quaternary.stratigraphy.org/correlation/chart.html.
- Lisiecki, Lorraine E.; Raymo, Maureen E. (2005). "A Pliocene-Pleistocene stack of 57 globally distributed benthic δ18O records". Paleoceanography 20 (1): n/a. doi:10.1029/2004PA001071. Bibcode: 2005PalOc..20.1003L. http://www.lorraine-lisiecki.com/LR04_MISboundaries.txt.
- Email from Lorraine Lisiecki
- Pettitt and White date MIS3 as 59,000 to 24,000 BP. They say: "In the terrestrial record, five non forested MIS3 interstadials have been identified from Dutch and German organic deposits, from oldest to youngest the Oerel, Glinde, Moershoofd/Moershoofd Complex, Hengelo (c.39-36,000 years BP) and Denekamp (c.32-28,000 years BP) interstadials. In Britain only one interstadial has been identified (as of 2012), the Upton-Warren (c.44-42,000 years BP).[15]
- Pettitt and White, p. 106
- Aitken & Stokes (1997), p. 14; Wright, p. 6
- all (MIS 22, 62, 103) from "Concise", figs 15.6 and 15.7
