VOL. 16, No. 12 A PUBLICATION OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA DECEMBER 2006 Marine sediment record from the East Antarctic margin reveals dynamics of ice sheet recession Inside: Section Meetings: Northeastern Section, p. 14 Southeastern Section, p. 22 Upcoming Application and Nomination Deadlines, p. 13 Now with $749 - academic Western US $1,499 - commercial landgrid data! RockWorks 3D Subsurface Data Management, Analysis, and Visualization All-in-one tool that allows you to visualize, interpret and present your surface and sub-surface data. Now with Access Database for powerful queries, built-in import/export tools for LogPlot data, and LAS and IHS import. Free trial avialable at www.rockware.com. $299.50 - academic $599 - commercial LogPlot Powerful. Flexible. Affordable. Display geotechnical, geophysical, mud logging, and oil/gas data as a graphic strip log. Plot single page logs for shallow borings, or multi-page/ continuous logs for deep wells. 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GSA TODAY publishes news and information for more than Photo taken March 2001 by Rob Dunbar, 20,000 GSA members and subscribing libraries. GSA Today Dept. of Geological and Environmental lead science articles should present the results of exciting new Sciences, Stanford University. See “Marine research or summarize and synthesize important problems or issues, and they must be understandable to all in the sediment record from the East Antarctic earth science community. Submit manuscripts to science margin reveals dynamics of ice sheet editors Gerald M. Ross, [email protected], or recession,” by A. Leventer et al., p. 4–10. Stephen Johnston, [email protected]. GSA TODAY (ISSN 1052-5173 USPS 0456-530) is published 11 times per year, monthly, with a combined April/May issue, by The Geological Society of America, Inc., with offices at 3300 Penrose Place, Boulder, Colorado. Mailing address: P.O. Box 9140, Boulder, CO 80301-9140, USA. 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This paper Robert Dunbar, Department of Geological and Environmental presents swath bathymetric maps (Fig. 1) and radiocarbon- Sciences, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305, USA; dated lithologic information (Fig. 2) that detail the chronology Jennifer Pike, Catherine Stickley, and Eleanor Maddison, and processes involved in ice sheet retreat from four regions of School of Earth, Ocean and Planetary Sciences, Cardiff the East Antarctic margin: Iceberg Alley (Mac.Robertson Shelf), University, CF10 3XQ Cardiff, UK; the Nielsen Basin (Mac.Robertson Shelf), the Svenner Chan- nel (eastern Prydz Bay), and the Mertz-Ninnis Trough (Wilkes Stefanie Brachfeld, Department of Geology, Montclair State Land margin). Each study target is a trough-shaped geomor- University, Montclair, New Jersey 07043, USA; phic feature that extends across the width of the East Antarctic Patricia Manley, Department of Geology, Middlebury College, shelf. As a consequence of their depth (400–1100 m), these Middlebury, Vermont 05753, USA; and troughs preserve a more complete section of sedimentation during deglaciation, in contrast to adjacent shallow parts of the Charlie McClennen, Department of Geology, Colgate shelf that were still affected by grounded ice and hence sites University, Hamilton, New York 13346, USA of nondeposition. These East Antarctic margin sedimentary records, which are remarkably similar to one another and to a record from the ABSTRACT Palmer Deep, Antarctic Peninsula (Domack et al., 2006), sup- The Antarctic shelf is traversed by large-scale troughs devel- port the cohesive response of these regions to climate forcings oped by glacial erosion. Swath bathymetric, lithologic, and at the end of the last glacial. Collectively, these data also pro- chronologic data from jumbo piston cores from four sites along vide important chronologic constraints for tracing northern ver- the East Antarctic margin (Iceberg Alley, the Nielsen Basin, the sus southern