Radiocarbon dating, sedimentation rate, granulometry and organic carbon content of ODP Leg 182 sites

This data report presents sedimentological (grain size) and geochemical (X-ray diffraction, total organic carbon, accelerator mass spectrometry radiocarbon, and percent carbonate) information obtained from the western transect (Sites 1132, 1130, and 1134) and the eastern transect (Sites 1129, 1131, and 1127) in the Great Australian Bight during Leg 182. The purpose is to quantify changing rates of sediment accumulation and changes in sediment type from the late Pleistocene and Holocene, in order to relate these changes to the well-known sea level curve that exists for this time frame. Ultimately, these data can be used to more effectively interpret lithologic variations deeper in the Pleistocene succession, which most likely represent orbitally forced sea level events.

Sediment texture, carbonate content, and carbonate mineralogy of ODP Holes 182-1130A and 182-1132B

At Sites 1130 and 1132 of Ocean Drilling Program Leg 182 in the Great Australian Bight, we recovered an expanded Pleistocene section dominated by packstone and wackestone, deposited at unusually high rates of >20 cm/k.y. Shipboard observations detected an intermittent meter-scale alternation of light gray intervals with olive-gray intervals. Meter-scale samples were collected from the upper 250 m at both sites and decimeter-scale samples from four selected 2.5- to 4.0-m intervals in order to determine the texture and composition of sediments deposited along the upper slope throughout the Quaternary. Detailed textural and compositional data are presented from a total of 540 samples collected from both sites. Results indicate a general coarsening upward at both sites, with an accompanying upcore increase in high-Mg calcite (HMC) and aragonite and a decrease in low-Mg calcite (LMC). Samples collected at decimeter-scale intervals substantiate that the alternating light gray and olive-gray units detected on board ship are lithologically distinct. Light gray units consist of an LMC-rich silt, whereas olive-gray units consist of an aragonite and HMC-rich sand and silt. Sediment sources as well as timing and controls of this cyclic depositional pattern will be the subject of further investigations.

Mineralogy, grain size composition, bulk carbonate isotopic ratios and ages of ODP Site 182-1128 sediments

This report presents mineralogic and geochemical data from Ocean Drilling Program Leg 182 Site 1128 in the Great Australian Bight. Clay mineralogy is dominated by mixed-layer illite-smectite, followed by minor amounts of kaolinite and illite, with intervals of pure smectite. Carbonate mineralogy is exclusively low-Mg calcite, except for one interval of dolomite in lower Oligocene sediments. Carbonate increases significantly in upper Eocene sediments, decreases through the lower Oligocene, then increases again in the Neogene. Quartz is present as a minor component that covaries inversely with carbonate. High-resolution sampling associated with Chron 13 normal (early Oligocene) reveals high-frequency (~23 k.y.) fluctuations in clay mineralogy and carbonate abundance and a positive oxygen and carbon isotope excursion (in bulk carbonates) related to Antarctic glaciation.