This planning visit award will support Dr. Ken B. Anderson and Scott E. Ishman, Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, to meet with counterparts, Prof. Sonia Helle and Prof. Guillermo Alfaro at the Universidad de Concepcion, on a proposed project to employ an innovative approach to investigating Neogene climate change, combining micropaleontological investigations of marine sediments with organic geochemical analyses of terrestrial sediments. This study area is uniquely suited for this investigation due to the presence of interleaved marine and organic terrestrial sediments arising from the opening of the Drake Passage (between Cape Horn and Antarctica), spanning the time period over which the region is believed to have undergone major climatic changes.
Professors Helle and Alfaro have extensive experience with and knowledge of the coal and sediment sequences with which this project is chiefly concerned. They have established relationships with, and access to working mines, and existing collaborations with other Chilean earth science professionals with experience of the Magallanes Basin and surrounding areas.
