The early to mid-Holocene marine tephrostratigraphic record in the Nisyros-Yali-Kos volcanic center, SE Aegean Sea

Abstract

The Kos-Nisyros-Yali volcanic region is one of the centers in the South Aegean Volcanic Arc to exhibit Holocene volcanic activity, with poorly dated thin tephra layers on Yali associated with Neolithic artifacts. This paper helps to resolve the age and character of early to mid - Holocene volcanism in the South Aegean Sea. It presents the lithostratigraphic record of seven newly recovered cores from this region at the SE termination of the South Aegean Volcanic Arc. The cores were scanned for magnetic susceptibility, split, logged and sampled at one centimeter resolution for carbonate content. Selected intervals were analyzed for grain size, organic carbon content, and feldspar content by XRD, in order to identify lithostratigraphic levels with enhanced volcanic minerals. Subsequently, textural and electron microprobe analyses of volcanic glass shards and pumice fragments were carried out on 20 samples. Chronology was inferred from the upper and lower limits of the S1 sapropel and from five AMS 14C dates on foraminifera. In several cores in the S1 interval, mixed volcanic glass types that compositionally correlate with the Nisyros Lower and Upper Pumice, Yali pumices and KPT suggest that the volcanic glass is reworked from previous deposits and transported by turbidity currents. Cores from deep water northeast and northwest of Yali have a single population of tephra at two or more horizons within S1 that geochemically resembles Holocene Yali–4 pumice on land. These beds likely represent air-fall ash that was dispersed at least 10 km from Yali, with ages of 8 and 10 ka. Moreover we report two or more tephra layers within S1 from the Kalymnos Basin that are not reworked and geochemically resemble Santorini tephra. This study thus confirms the occurrence of small early Holocene eruptions at Yali and provides possible evidence for early Holocene eruptions at Santorini.