This study attempts to define the early to mid-Holocene paleoenvironment at Huaca Prieta, an archaeological site on the north coast of Peru, through a combination of sedimentological, paleoecological, and stable isotope analyses. This research is part of a larger collaborative study drawing on many disciplines, and the interpretations of the results presented here are solely from a geological perspective. Multiple studies point to a severely diminished or even absent El Niño in the region during the mid-Holocene, but the Chicama River valley is a relatively unstudied location. Sediment coring from the upper 6 m reveals laminated to thinly bedded carbonates, organic sediments, and fine-grained clays deposited within larger intervals of sands and silts. These finer-grained sediments evidence a coastal lagoon 3 km in length which existed approximately 7300-6200 cal ybp. Stratigraphic analysis of the upper 6 m of sediments reveals a marked decrease in siliciclastic material delivered to the floodplain during this time, with potential implications for the mid-Holocene El Niño frequency debate and human-environment linkages during this time.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VANDERBILT/oai:VANDERBILTETD:etd-07132011-113921 |
| Date | 11 August 2011 |
| Creators | Beavins Tracy, Rachel Anne |
| Contributors | Larisa DeSantis, Steven Goodbred |
| Publisher | VANDERBILT |
| Source Sets | Vanderbilt University Theses |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.vanderbilt.edu/available/etd-07132011-113921/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to Vanderbilt University or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
Page generated in 0.0794 seconds