HR: 11:40h
AN: OS32A-06    [Abstracts]
TI: Paleoceanographic Research in Mexico: Holocene Marine Sedimentary Record of the Gulf of California
AU: * Perez-Cruz, L
EM: perezcruz@geofisica.unam.mx
AF: Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, Instituto de Geofisica, Ciudad Universitaria, Coyoacan, Mexico, DF 04510, Mexico
AB: An overview of Holocene paleoceanographic studies the Gulf of California is presented, with emphasis on contributions from Mexican institutions. The Gulf of California is our best modern example of a young oceanic basin in the early stages of rifting. The Gulf stretches south to north for more than 1200 km, from the ocean- continent boundary at the mouth of the Gulf to a sediment-filled continental rift at its northern limit. Recent studies in the Gulf have produced some new ideas and models about its circulation patterns and the controls on interannual to decadal timescales, which demand attention for the importance on the tropical and equatorial Pacific as the main region of forcing. The paleoceanographic community has been interested in the very unique records covering the seafloor of the Gulf. The Gulf sedimentary records show extremely high fidelity of annual to decadal oceanic and climatic past variability. Community of earth scientists in Mexico and abroad has been drawn to these sediments for its possibilities as a rich repository of detailed oceanographic and climatic information. In particular, they have studied sedimentary records from the Gulf to understand oceanographic and climatic changes that shaped its circulation and sediment production patterns, to develop ocean and climate scenarios in different space-time scales during Holocene and to interpret the nature and origin of these records. Several proxy data have been used to infer climatic and oceanographic changes. Major efforts have concentrated on five sites that share two important oceanographic features. All of them are under oxygen deficient waters and accumulate the remains of rich high biological productivity waters above: Guaymas, Carmen, Pescadero, La Paz, and Alfonso basins. Several cores of various lengths have been collected at each of the five sites, which are being studied at different institutions and universities in the country to gain information about the climatic and oceanographic changes of the tropical ocean and its deeper waters of remote origin in this valuable natural laboratory of the Gulf of California.
DE: 4200 OCEANOGRAPHY: GENERAL
DE: 4262 Ocean observing systems
DE: 4500 OCEANOGRAPHY: PHYSICAL
DE: 4800 OCEANOGRAPHY: BIOLOGICAL AND CHEMICAL (0460)
SC: Ocean Sciences [OS]
MN: 2007 Joint Assembly