Relative palaeointensity records from the Ontong-Java Plateau

Abstract

SUMMARY Rock magnetic, palaeomagnetic and oxygen isotopic results are presented from core RNDB 75p, which was recovered from the Ontong-Java Plateau (OJP). A high degree of uniformity in magnetic properties characterized by relatively small changes in concentration and grain size in the upper 4 m of the core, combined with a lack of coherence between the normalized remanence and rock magnetic data suggests that the natural remanence normalized by saturation remanence reflects variations in relative palaeointensity of the geomagnetic field. The record from RNDB 75p replicates other Ontong-Java records spanning the last 400Ka and extends the record back to some 700Ka. Spectral analysis of the Ontong-Java record suggests periodic behaviour in the relative palaeointensity record with a dominant period of between 30 and 40Ka, which appears not be be an artefact of lithologic variability. This dominant period lies between functions describing climatic precession and obliquity changes in the Earth’s orbit. Comparison of the normalized remanence record with astronomical precession (26 Ka period), however, is much more favorable. None the less, ‘tuning’ the palaeointensity record to that of astronomical precession appears inconsistent with existing isotopic age constraints derived from the SPECMAP time-scale. Based on these data, we must choose between assuming that the Earth’s orbit controlled ice volume (inherent in the SPECMAP time-scale) and assuming that the Earth’s magnetic field is driven by astronomical precession. The former assumption has a substantial theoretical and observational base and we prefer to interpret the data presented here as suggesting that the Earth’s orbit has not played a detectable role in the modulation of the magnetic field. Plots of saturation remanence and magnetic susceptibility are very sensitive to quite subtle changes in magnetic grain size. A slight shift within the pseudo-singledomain grain-size range toward the multidomain (or superparamagnetic) field was detected at about 4m in RNDB 75p. This change in grain size may reflect a diagenetic alteration of the magnetite (such as dissolution) and may be related to the phenomenon responsible for the loss of magnetic remanence at depth detected in other cores from the region.