Chemistry of pore water and solids, formation factors and salt-corrected porosities of DSDP Site 68-503

Recent discoveries relating to the circulation of fluids within the oceanic crust include the finding of both important fluxes of elements and isotopes into the oceans by ridge-crest hydrothermal convection and important fluxes of heat out of the oceanic crust by convection at ridge crests and at some distance from ridge crests. In the present chapter, I present isotopic, chemical, and physical data from sediments and pore waters of Deep Sea Drilling Project (DSDP) Holes 503A and 503B. These results are modeled in terms of pore-water diffusion, advection, and production to ascertain the relative contribution of these processes at this location, 7.5 m.y. removed from ridge-crest hydrothermal activity. The observations made here contribute to the understanding of chemical and heat transport in oceanic crust of moderate age.

Sedimentology and stable isotope record of DSDP Hole 68-503B

Samples from the upper portion of a cyclic pelagic carbonate sediment sequence in Deep-Sea Drilling Project (DSDP) hole 503B (4.0°N, 95.6°W) are the first group to be analyzed for paleoceanographic and paleoclimatic proxy-indicators of ice volume, deep ocean and surface water circulation, and atmospheric circulation in order to resolve the complex origin of the cyclicity. Temporal resolution is taken from the delta18O time scale, most other parameters are calculated in terms of their mass flux to the seafloor. CaCO3 percent in the sediments fluctuates in the well-known Pacific pattern and is higher during glacial times. The fluxes of opal and organic carbon have patterns similar to each other and show a variability of a factor of 2.5 to 4. The longer organic carbon record shows flux maxima during both glacial and interglacial times. The accumulation patterns of both opal and organic carbon suggest that the variability in surface water productivity and/or seafloor preservation of those materials is not simply correlated to glacial or interglacial periods. Eolian dust fluxes are greater during interglacial periods by factors of 2 to 5, indicating that eolian source regions in central and northern South America were more arid during interglacial periods. The record of eolian grain size provides a semiquantitative estimation of the intensity of the transporting winds. The eolian data suggest more intense atmospheric circulation during interglacial periods, opposite to the anticipated results. We interpret this observation as recording the southerly shift of the intertropical convergence zone to the latitude of hole 503B during glaciations.