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Contrasting sensitivity of weathering proxies to Quaternary climate and sea level fluctuations in the southern South China Sea
  • +9
  • Yi Zhong,
  • David Wilson,
  • Jiabo Liu,
  • Shiming Wan,
  • Rui Bao,
  • Jianxing Liu,
  • Yanan Zhang,
  • Xuesong Wang,
  • Yuanhao Liu,
  • Xiaoyu Liu,
  • Ying Zhao,
  • Qingsong Liu
Yi Zhong
Department of Marine Science and Engineering, Southern University of Science and Technology,

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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David Wilson
University College London
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Jiabo Liu
Center for Marine Magnetism, Department of Ocean Science and Engineering, Southern University of Science and Technology
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Shiming Wan
Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
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Rui Bao
ETH Zurich
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Jianxing Liu
First Institute of Oceanography,Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) , China
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Yanan Zhang
Center for Marine Magnetism (CM2), Department of Ocean Science and Engineering, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen 518055, PR China
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Xuesong Wang
Key Laboratory of Ocean and Marginal Sea Geology, South China Sea Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
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Yuanhao Liu
Center for Marine Magnetism (CM2), Department of Ocean Science and Engineering, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen 518055, PR China
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Xiaoyu Liu
Center for Marine Magnetism (CM2), Department of Ocean Science and Engineering, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen 518055, PR China
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Ying Zhao
Center for Marine Magnetism (CM2), Department of Ocean Science and Engineering, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen 518055, PR China
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Qingsong Liu
South University of Science and Technology of China
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Abstract

Tropical marginal seas host unique sedimentary archives that may be exploited to reveal past changes in continental erosion, chemical weathering, and ocean dynamics. However, these records can be challenging to interpret due to the complex interactions between climate and particulate transport across ocean margins. For the southern South China Sea over the last 90 thousand years, we observe a contrasting temporal relationship between the deposition of clay minerals (smectite) and magnetic minerals (hematite), which were associated with two different hydrodynamic modes. Fine-grained clay minerals can be carried in suspension by ocean currents, leading to a rapid response to regional climate-driven inputs. In contrast, changes in magnetic mineralogy were closely associated with bedload transport and resuspension linked to glacial-interglacial sea-level variability. Overall, this study indicates that the transfer pathways and mechanisms imparted by varying hydrodynamic conditions exert a substantial influence on the distribution of terrigenous material in continental shelf sediments.