Abstract
The depth–time pattern of calcite accumulation recorded at Deep Sea Drilling Project (DSDP) sites beneath the oligotrophic subtropical gyre in the south-east Pacific Ocean allows us to define here both the calcite compensation depth (CCD) and the lysocline. The Neogene CCD history is one of shoaling before 15 or 20 Myr and subsequent deepening to the present level of 4,100 m. A broad zone of increased calcite dissolution, 600 m thick, formed during early to middle Miocene time and has remained. This zone, the lysocline, denotes an important change in ocean chemistry and may reflect either an increase in the volume of more corrosive deep water beginning about 18 Myr and reaching steady state by 14 Myr, the time of rapid ice build-up in Antarctica, or an increase in calcite rain rate caused by an increase in surface-water productivity.
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Rea, D., Leinen, M. Neogene history of the calcite compensation depth and lysocline in the South Pacific Ocean. Nature 316, 805–807 (1985). https://doi.org/10.1038/316805a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/316805a0
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