Paleoclimate Landmarks and Heroes (Spring 2017)

GEOL 5700-4 - Seminar in Paleoclimate

K-T boundary, Raton Basin

K-T boundary, Raton Basin

Coring in Florida Straits

Coring in Florida Straits

Ìý

Marchitto's seminar courses (archived)

Most are Geological Sciences courses with titles like "Seminars in Paleoclimate". ÌýAsterisks* denote courses titled "Super-Problems in Quaternary Climate"

Course description: This course will be a Kafka-like toboggan ride through the paleoclimate literature. Paper choices will be guided by the confluence of 'landmark' contributions, paleoclimate 'heroes,' and several topics of interest to students*. No time period or topic will be off-limits.

Possible inspiration for landmark papers (the books are all on reserve in the Bartlett Info Center at SEEC):

  • Paleoclimates (2010) by Tom Cronin
  • Paleoclimate (2013) by Mike Bender
  • Ice Ages: Solving the Mystery (1979) by John and Katherine Imbrie
  • The Glacial World According to Wally (2002) by Wally Broecker

Some mega-landmarks that will not be assigned, but that every student of paleoclimatology should read:

Here are some topics that were brainstormed on Day 1:

  • ocean acidification and anoxia
  • pre-Pleistocene paleo pCO2
  • rapid warming events (e.g. PETM, ELMO)
  • tectonics and climate
  • glacier/ice sheet dynamics
  • ocean and atmosphere circulation
  • Great Oxidation Event
  • Snowball Earth

The students' list of 'heroes' is given in the Day 1 PowerPoint, below.

Expectations and grading: During the semester each student will be required to make one formal AGU-style presentation on an assigned reading, and to lead the discussion of that reading. Each student will also be responsible for leading informal discussions of up to two additional papers during the semester. Each week everyone is responsible for reading the papers and participating in the discussions. Grades will be based on overall participation (50%) and on the effort put into the presentations and discussion-leading (50%).

Meets: Thursdays 3-4:40, SEEC S298
Instructor:, tom.marchitto@colorado.edu
Office Hours: By appointment, SEEC S153C or Benson 435
Credits: 2

(nothing here yet)

_________________________________________________________________________________

Course schedule (updated weekly)

Note that many of the links below must be accessed from a campus computer or via VPN. Refresh your browser if links are missing or dead

Week 1: Organizational meeting

Below is some potentially useful background material on paleoclimatology and climate forcings:

Week 2: Recognition of the CO2 problem
(David)
(Garrett)
In the same vein, the paper that is credited with coining the term 'global warming':

Week 3: The Phanerozoic Greenhouse/Icehouse paradigm
(Simon)
(Brigitta)
The critical underlying 'Vail curve':

Week 4: Phanerozoic pCO2: Controls and terrestrial evidence
(Rhiana)
(Sarah)
Berner's update to include sulfur and O2:
Recent GEOCARBSULF simulation with comparison to proxies:

Week 5: An ocean view of pCO2
(Garrett)
(Simon)

Week 6: Chicken or egg? Chicken and egg? Chicken and waffles?
(Anne)
(Lina)

Week 7: Climate models. Huh. Yeah. What are they good for?
(Garrett)
(Joe)
Energy balance model used by Barron et al., with a brief discussion of the landmark models that came before:
Landmark modeling study on latent heat transport under elevated CO2, with a very brief comment on the Mesozoic (p. 117):
A more recent attempt to simulate an equable climate using an AGCM (CCSM3):

Week 8: When the sea suffered from indigestion: OAEs
(Anne)
(Sarah)
The paper that coined the term 'OAE':
Perspectives piece on the modern relevance of OAEs:
Everything you never wanted to know about the marine phosphorous cycle:

Week 9: PETM warming and ocean acidification
(Abby)
(Brigitta)
Overview of geologic acidification events, with a marine carbon primer:
Boron isotopic constraint on the surface pH drop:
Extracting rates without an age model:
All about microtektites:
The jacuzzi paper:

Week 10: Tectonic gateways and Pleistocene glaciation
(Lina)
(Joe)
MOC reorganization at ~4.6 Ma linked to Panama closure:
El Nino-like Pliocene would have inhibited glaciation:
What might have caused an El Nino-like Pliocene?
The latest word on Panama vs. Indonesia:

Week 11: Marine d18O, the Rosetta Stone of the ice age cycles
(Rhiana)
(David)
Phase relationships between climate and orbital forcing in the late Pleistocene:

Week 12: Milankovitch mysteries
(Sarah)
(Simon)
Competing idea for the 40k world:
Influential work on the 100k world:
Or is it this simple?

Week 13: LGM to Holocene ocean-atmosphere dynamics
(Anne)
(Abby)

Week 14: Enter: Humans
(Brigitta)
(David)

Week 15: Exit: Toboggan
(Lina)
(Joe)
Philiosophical take on our historical attitude toward nature: