Principal Investigator:Thomas A. Davies

Funded by: National Science Foundation

Work in progress is directed toward the preparation and interpretation of palinspastic maps that show the patterns of sediment distribution in the oceans at various times through the Cenozoic. Such maps clearly delineate the principal depocenters and show how the sedimentary record has responded on an oceanwide scale to changes in paleogeography, paleocirculation and climate. The time-slice approach exemplified by the maps has become applicable on a wide scale only recently, as both the number and geographic coverage of continuously cored deep-sea drillsites have increased. This approach complements the contributions of time-series and model studies to identifying and understanding significant events in the Cenozoic history of the oceans and the changing global environment.