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VOLUME 30 / NUMBER 1 / 1988 Published by THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SCIENCE Editor MINZE STUIVER Associate Editors To serve until January 1, 1989 STEPHEN C PORTER Seattle, Washington To serve until January 1, 1989 W G MOOK Groningen, The Netherlands HANS OESCHGER Bern, Switzerland To serve until January 1, 1990 ANDREW MOORE New Haven, Connecticut To serve until January 1, 1992 CALVIN J HEUSSER Tuxedo, New York Managing Editor RENEE S KRA Kline Geology Laboratory Yale University I New Haven, Connecticut 06511 ISSN: 0033-8222 NOTICE TO READERS AND CONTRIBUTORS Since its inception, the basic purpose of RADIOCARBON has been the publication of compilations of ' 4C dates produced by various laboratories. These lists are extremely useful for the dissemination of basic 14C information. In recent years, RADIOCARBON has also been publishing technical and interpretative articles on all aspects of 14C. We would like to encourage this type of publication on a regular basis. In addition, we will be publishing compilations of published and unpublished dates along with interpretative text for these dates on a regional basis. Authors who would like to compose such an article for his/her area of interest should contact the Managing Editor for infor- mation. Another section is added to our regular issues, "Notes and Comments." Authors are invited to extend discussions or raise pertinent questions to the results of scientific inves- tigations that have appeared on our pages. The section includes short, technical notes to relay information concerning innovative sample preparation procedures. Laboratories may also seek assistance in technical aspects of radiocarbon dating. Book reviews will also be included for special editions. Manuscripts of radiocarbon papers should follow the recommendations in Suggestions to Authors* and RADIOCARBON Style Guide (R, 1984, v 26, p 152-158). Our deadline schedule for submitting manuscripts is: For Date Vol 30, No. 3, 1988 May 1, 1988 Vol 31, No. 1, 1989 Sept 1, 1988 Vol 31, No. 2, 1989 Jan 1, 1989 Half life of 14C. In accordance with the decision of the Fifth Radiocarbon Dating Conference, Cambridge, 1962, all dates published in this volume (as in previous volumes) are based on the Libby value, 5570 ± 30 yr, for the half life. This decision was reaffirmed at the 1 1 th International Radiocarbon Conference in Seattle, Washington, 1982. Because of various uncertainties, when 14C measurements are expressed as dates in years BP the accuracy of the dates is limited, and refinements that take some but not all uncertainties into account may be misleading. The mean of three recent determinations of the half life, 5730 ± 40 yr, (Nature, v 195, no. 4845, p 984, 1962), is regarded as the best value presently available. Published dates in years BP can be converted to this basis by multiplying them by 1.03. AD/BC Dates. In accordance with the decision of the Ninth International Radiocarbon Con- ference, Los Angeles and San Diego, 1976, the designation of AD/BC, obtained by subtracting AD 1950 from conventional BP determinations is discontinued in Radiocarbon. Authors or submitters may include calendar estimates as a comment, and report these estimates as cal AD/BC, citing the specific calibration curve used to obtain the estimate. Calibrated dates will now be reported as "cal BP" or "cal AD/BC" according to the consensus of the Twelfth International Radiocarbon Conference, Trondheim, Norway, 1985. Meaning of b"C. In Volume 3, 1961, we endorsed the notation A (Lamont VIII, 1961) for geochemical measurements of 14C activity, corrected for isotopic fractionation in samples and S14C in the NBS oxalic-acid standard. The value of that entered the calculation of A was defined by reference to Lamont VI, 1959, and was corrected for age. This fact has been lost sight of, by editors as well as by authors, and recent papers have used 514C as the observed deviation from the standard. At the New Zealand Radiocarbon Dating Conference it was recommended to use b14C only for age-corrected samples. Without an age correction, the value should then be reported as percent of modern relative to 0.95 NBS oxalic acid (Pro- ceedings 8th Conference on Radiocarbon Dating, Wellington, New Zealand, 1972). The Ninth International Radiocarbon Conference, Los Angeles and San Diego, 1976, recom- mended that the reference standard, 0.95 times NBS oxalic acid activity, be normalized to 613C = -19°/bo. 14C In several fields, however, age corrections are not possible. 6 and A, uncorrected for age, have been used extensively in oceanography, and are an integral part of models and theories. For the present, therefore, we continue the editorial policy of using A notations for samples not corrected for age. *Suggestions to Authors of the Reports of the United States Geological Survey, 6th ed, 1978, Supt of Documents, U S Govt Printing Office, Washington, DC 20402. Vol 30, No. 1 Radiocarbon 1988. CONTENTS Measurements AA Mozeto, Peter Fritz, M7. Moreira, E Vetter, Ramon Aravena, Eneas Salati, and Rf Drimmie ................................................................. 1 The Relations Between Carbon Isotope Composition and Apparent Age of Freshwater Tufaceous Sediments Anna Pazdur ......................................................................................... 7 Determination of Radon by Liquid Scintillation a/i3 Particle Spectrometry: Towards the Resolution of a 14C Dating Problem Henry Polach and Lauri Kaihola ............................................................. Cultural Evolution and Paleogeography on the Santa Barbara Coast: A 9600-Year 14C Record from Southern California Jon M Erlandson .................................................................................... DATE LISTS DE IC Yang US Geological Survey, Denver, Colorado Radiocarbon Dates V........... Gif Georgette Delibrias and Marie-Therese Guiltier Gif Natural Radiocarbon Measurements XI ......................................... HR Jinadasa Katupotha Hiroshima University Radiocarbon Dates I: West and South Coasts of Sri Lanka ............................................................................................. NOTES AND COMMENTS Letter to the Editor Rene Letolle ........................................................................................... The Second international Symposium on Archaeology and 14C Renee Kra ............................................................................................. 130 Review: Radiocarbon Dating: An Archaeological Perspective, by RE Taylor Frank Hole ............................................................................................ l 31 Preliminary Statement on an Error in British Museum Radiocarbon Dates MS Tile, SGE Bowman, JC Ambers, and KJ Malthews ............................... 132 I [RADIOCARBON, VOL 30, NO 1, 1988, P 1-6] Radiocarbon 1988 GROWTH RATES OF NATURAL AMAZONIAN FOREST TREES BASED ON RADIOCARBON MEASUREMENTS A A MOZETO*, PETER FRITZ**, M Z MOREIRAt, E VETTER*, RAMON ARAVENA**, ENEAS SALATIf and R J DRIMMIE** ABSTRACT. Evergreen trees in the tropical rain forest of the Amazonas Basin can produce growth rings which are not necessarily related to annual events. Therefore, estimation of growth rate cannot be done by dendrochronology. This report presents a technique for deter- mining the growth rate of these trees based on radiocarbon measurements of two segments of equal radial distance from the outer part of the tree trunk. The measured 14C activity is com- pared to local 14C fallout and growth rates are derived from models taking into account bomb 14C effects. Eleven trees from various parts of the Amazon Basin were analyzed. The average growth rates range from ca 5 to > 40 yr per centimeter corresponding to extrapolated ages from ca 60 to > 400 yr. INTRODUCTION Rings of trees growing in temperate climate permit accurate dating of forest stands and determination of growth rates. Such information cannot be obtained on evergreen trees from tropical rain forests. In the Amazonas region annual flooding does, however, cause some cyclicity in tree growth so that trees which defoliate during submersion show annual rings reflect- ing the cambial dormancy induced by lack of oxygen in the root zone. Growth rings of such trees are "often undefined and boundaries frequently run irregularly over the cross section" (Worbes, 1985). In 1980 an international workshop was held to discuss "age and growth rate of tropical trees: new directions for research" (Borman & Berlyn, 1980). It concluded that very few data exist but identified some promising avenues. Among others, Stuiver et al (1980) proposed to use radiocarbon to establish growth rates. The technique would take advantage of the anthropogenic input to the atmospheric radiocarbon reservoir and especially the maximum fallout in the Northern and Southern Hemisphere which followed nuclear testing in 1963/64. This suggestion was applied in modified form in this study. The tree species reported in this study were selected based on the wood specific weight (ratio of dry weight/water saturated weight of the heartwood) and the diameter of tree trunk so as to select both old and young trees. The location and the time of cutting is known and species were * Universidade Federal de Sao Carlos, Departamento de Quimica, Caixa Postal 676, 13560-Sao Carlos, SP, Brazil ** University of Waterloo, Department of Earth Sciences, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3G1 t Centro de Energia Nuclear na Agricultura, Universidade de Sao Paulo, Caixa Postal 96, 13400-Piracicaba, SP, Brazil