15/07/2019

Please join me in congratulating of GRG member Dr. Belinda Dechnik on the publication of her fantastic new paper in the journal Quaternary Science Reviews.

Dechnik, B., Bastos, A.C., Vieira, L.S., Webster, J.M., Fallon, S., Yokoyama, Y., Nothdurft, L., Sanborn, K., Batista, J., Moura, R. and Amado-Filho, G., 2019. Holocene reef growth in the tropical southwestern Atlantic: Evidence for sea level and climate instability. Quaternary Science Reviews, 218: 365-377. 10.1016/j.quascirev.2019.06.039

For the first time, this work investigates Holocene reefs flat evolution, sea level and climate variability along the eastern margin of Brazil. The paper’s specific objectives were to 1) undertake a detailed chronological analysis of closely spaced ages across these reefs to establish the timing of when they first approached sea level and 2) identify and constrain any observed relative sea level oscillations and/or reef flat hiatuses and attribute any potential response to global climatic or regional environmental changes.

Some of the paper’s highlights include:

• We report the lowest Holocene sea level highstand for the south eastern Brazilian region.
• Two relative sea level oscillations identified at ∼3.7 ka and 2 ka respectively.
• Hiatus in reef flat growth identified from 3.7 to 2.5 ka.

The study is part of a wonderful, ongoing collaboration between the GRG and Associate Professor Alex Basto’s marine geology & geophysics group (Laboratório de Oceanografia Geológica – LaboGeo) at Universidade Federal do Espírito Santo, Vitoria, Brazil. This paper represents the first in series of new papers from Belinda who just completed her post doc with Alex, working jointly between Brazil and USYD.

Bravo Belinda and Alex!

Cheers

Jody

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