Sediments from the eastern levee of the Amazon Fan show 0.18 values that indicate marked episodic changes in the deep.sea flow regime during glacial times. It is hypothesized that the Amazon Fan is a climatically sensitive area of surface water return flow to the area of deep.water formation in the North Atlantic. To test this hypothesis, the PI will look for evidence of paleodischarge events via changes in the 0.18 content of planktonic foraminifera. These cores already were collected by a German cruise earlier this year.
