The proposed research will enhance our knowledge of the history of eustatic, (or global) sea-level changes over the last 100 million years. This information is critical in earth-science studies because eustatic sea-level change is the datum against which all tectonics is measured. It is also an indicator of continental glaciation and of large changes in ocean generation and continental orogeny. Finally, if short-term sea-level change (=0.5 - 3 m.y. variations) can be shown to be eustatic, and dated then it could be used for global correlation at a scale finer than that of most biostratigraphic methods. The detailed analyses of boreholes drilled in the New Jersey coastal plain in conjunction with offshore sequence stratigraphic analyses and offshore well data provide an unprecedented data set for analysis of both long-term and short-term sea-level changes. By performing backstripping analyses of these data, we expect to make major strides in assessing the reality of short-term eustasy and it's magnitude, while at the same time providing very important feedback on the implications of stratigraphic interpretation as they are made. Previous work has shown that the data obtained from these types of boreholes (ODP leg 150X) is sufficient to obtain magnitudes of short-term (0.5 - 3.0 m.y. duration) sea-level events. The new wells will verify or complicate our understanding of the middle to late Cenozoic record, extend eustatic (global sea-level) estimates back to the late Cretaceous, and extend sea-level (regional) estimates to the middle Cretaceous. The results of this work will be critical to studies of offshore sequences and studies of sea-level changes of this age in many other margins.
