Dating Techniques
Dating techniques in the Quaternary time range fall into three broad
categories:
• Methods that provide age estimates.
• Methods that establish age-equivalence.
• Relative age methods.
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Dating Techniques
Age Estimates: Radiometric dating techniques
Are methods based in the radioactive properties of certain unstable chemical
elements, from which atomic particles are emitted in order to achieve a more
stable atomic form.
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Dating Techniques
Age Estimates: Radiometric dating techniques
Application of the principle of radioactivity to geological dating requires that
certain fundamental conditions be met.
If an event is associated with the incorporation of a radioactive nuclide, then
providing:
(a) that none of the daughter nuclides are present in the initial stages and,
(b) that none of the daughter nuclides are added to or lost from the materials to
be dated,
then the estimates of the age of that event can be obtained if the ration between
parent and daughter nuclides can be established, and if the decay rate is
known.
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Dating Techniques
Age Estimates: Radiometric dating techniques - Uranium-series dating
238Uranium, 235Uranium and 232Thorium all decay to stable lead isotopes
through complex decay series of intermediate nuclides with widely differing half-
lives.
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Dating Techniques
Age Estimates: Radiometric dating techniques - Uranium-series dating
• Bone
• Speleothems
• Lacustrine deposits
• Peat
• Coral
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Dating Techniques
Age Estimates: Radiometric dating techniques - Thermoluminescence (TL)
Electrons can be freed by heating and emit a characteristic emission of light
which is proportional to the number of electrons trapped within the crystal lattice.
Termed thermoluminescence.
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Dating Techniques
Age Estimates: Radiometric dating techniques - Thermoluminescence (TL)
Applications:
• archeological sample, especially pottery.
• deep sea sediments and,
• loess deposits
www.pastperfect.info/archaeology/lo/tl.jpg
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Dating Techniques
Cosmogenic Dating
Cosmogenic isotopes are created when elements in the atmosphere or earth
are bombarded by high energy particles (cosmic rays) that penetrate into the
atmosphere from outer space. It was discovered about a decade ago that
cosmic ray interaction with silica and oxygen in quartz produced measurable
amounts of the isotopes Beryllium-10 and Aluminium-26.
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Dating Techniques
Radiocarbon Dating
Free neutrons resulting from nuclear
reactions in the upper atmosphere
collide with other atoms and
molecules, and one effect is the
displacement of protons from
nitrogen atoms to produce carbon
atoms.
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Dating Techniques
Radiocarbon Dating
All living matter that absorbs carbon
dioxide during tissue-building,
therefore, contains carbon isotopes in a
ratio which is in equilibrium with
atmospheric carbon dioxide.
Upon death, 14C within the inorganic
tissues will continue to decay, but no
replacement takes place, Hence if the
rate of decay of 14C is known, date of
death can be computed from the
measured 14C activity.
earthsci.org/fossils/geotime/radate/cycle.gif
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Dating Techniques
Radiocarbon Dating
Radiocarbon dating rest on four fundamental assumptions:
• that the production of 14C is constant over time
• that the 14C: 12C ratio in the biosphere and hydrosphere is in
equilibrium with the atmospheric ratio,
• that the decay rate of 14C is known; and
• that an equilibrium constant has been achieved between production and
decay, which does not vary substantially over time.
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Dating Techniques
Sources of error in 14C dating
• Variations of 14C over time.
• Circulation of marine carbon.
• Hard water.
• Contamination.
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Dating Techniques
Incremental Methods
Incremental methods are those based on regular additions of material to organic
tissue or sedimentary sequences. Those which have been most widely used
are
1. dendrochronology (tree-ring dating),
2. varve chronology, and
3. lichenometry.
These techniques are restricted in application largely to the Holocene although
varve chronology has been used as a means of dating earlier Quaternary
successions.
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Dating Techniques
Dendrochronology
In most temperate trees, new water and food-conducting vessels are added to
the outer perimeter of the trunk each growth season, following an interactive
period in winter. This produces a distinct line between successive annual
increments of wood growth and counting of these lines (tree-rings) allows the
age of the tree to be established.
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Dating Techniques
Dendrochronology
Obtain a core or cut dead tree for cross-section.
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Dating Techniques
Dendrochronology
• Ring patterns within trees from a limited geographical area can be matched
through the technique of cross-dating.
• Climatic variations within a particular area will be reflected in characteristic
ring-width patterns in the trees of that area.
• Distinctive rings, or grouped of rings, form markers and these can be used
as a basis for cross-matching between trees of overlapping age range.
002 999 997 994
2 1 1 1
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Dating Techniques
Varve Chronology
Rhythmic accumulations of sediments (varves),
forming laminae of fine sands, silts or clay, are
common in the geological record.
Because they are deposited annually, varves can be
used as a means of dating, for time intervals can
be calculated and a floating chronology
established. it may be possible to assign calendar
dates to the varve record.
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Dating Techniques
Glaciolacustrine and glaciomarine varves
Large supplies of sediment are deposited in
proglacial lakes and shallow seas as a result
of rapid spring and summer ice melt.
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Dating Techniques
Other varved sediments
• In deep lakes with oxygen deficient basal water, the numbers of bottom-
dwelling fauna are restricted, vertical water circulation does not extend to the
bottom of the water column and fine laminations may be preserved.
• Diatom-rich summer layers in lamination have been observed in interglacial
and modern sediments.
• Seasonal variation in iron oxide precipitation may also lead to the formation
of laminations. In some lakes, variations in the accumulation of organic
matter or of chemical precipitates are superimposed on particle-size
variations, thereby emphasizing contrasts between winter and summer
layers.
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Dating Techniques
Lichenometry
Lichenometry as a dating technique rests on the principle that there is a direct
relationship between lichen size and age.
Lichenometry has been most widely
employed in the dating of glacier
recession.
academic.emporia.edu/.../ice/lec10/lichen04.jpg
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Dating Techniques
Lichenometry
Not all lichens are suitable for lichenometrical purposes, however; only those
that show a gradual and progressive rate of growth can be employed.
academic.emporia.edu/.../ice/lec10/lichen04.jpg
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Dating Techniques
Age-equivalent stratigraphic markers
In many Quaternary deposits, distinctive
marker horizons are found that are
broadly synchronous and form time
planes across different sedimentary
sequences.
• Paleomagnetism
• Tephrachronology
• aminostratigraphy
academic.emporia.edu/aberjame/ice/lec10/f10b2.jpg
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Dating Techniques
Paleomagnetism
The earth’s magnetic field varies constantly both in field strength and in polarity
direction. Rocks and unconsolidated sediments containing magnetic
minerals are magnetized during formation, and individual crystals or particles
therefore become aligned in the ambient magnetic field.
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Dating Techniques
Paleomagnetism
Volcanic rocks contain minerals with various ferromagnetic properties. The
presence of a magnetic field then influences and aligns the orientation of
ferromagnetic minerals.
Sedimentary rocks and unconsolidated sediments accumulating on the sea
floor or in lakes also contain evidence of former geomagnetic fields, for a
record is preserved in the alignment of ferromagnetic sedimentary particles
as they settle in water or in water-saturated sediments.
www.ub.es/ggac/research/piris/sampling.jpg
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Dating Techniques
Magnetostratigraphy
The study of variations in magnetic properties through a sequence of rocks or
sediments is termed magnetostratigraphy. provides a means of relative
dating and correlation.
Field reversals and the paleomagnetic time-scale
From time to time the geomagnetic field reverses so that the geomagnetic poles
change relative positions through 180° and these then remain stable for a
while. These polarity reversals can be detected in the geological record and
are of fundamental importance in paleomagnetic studies.
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Dating Techniques
Magnetostratigraphy
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Dating Techniques
Tephrachronology
Following a volcanic eruption ash or tephra is often spread rapidly over a
relatively wide area and forms a thin cover over contemporaneous peat
surfaces, lake floor sediments, estuarine sediments, river terraces, etc.
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Dating Techniques
Relative chronology based on processes of chemical alteration
Fossils, sediments and rocks are affected by a number of chemical reactions
that are partly time-dependent. The degree of alteration brought about by
different chemical reactions increases with time, and this therefore offers a
basis for relative dating.
epod.usra.edu/archive/images/soilprofile22.jpg
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Dating Techniques
Relative chronology based on processes of chemical alteration
Biogeochemistry of amino acids (aminostratigraphy)
All living organisms contain proteins made up of amino acids. The proteins
produced by organisms consist almost entirely of amino acids in the L-
isomer (left-handed) configuration. Upon death, the L amino acids begin
inverting to their respective D-isomer (dextral or right-handed)
configurations. This process is called racemization.
The use of amino acids ratios to rank fossils and their associated sediments
according to relative age is termed aminostratigraphy.
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