[1] Mid-Cretaceous (Barremian-Turonian) plankton preserved in deep-sea marl, organic-rich shale, and pelagic carbonate hold an important record of how the marine biosphere responded to short-and long-term changes in the ocean-climate system. Oceanic anoxic events (OAEs) were short-lived episodes of organic carbon burial that are distinguished by their widespread distribution as discrete beds of black shale and/or pronounced carbon isotopic excursions. OAE1a in the early Aptian ($120.5 Ma) and OAE2 at the Cenomanian/Turonian boundary ($93.5 Ma) were global in their distribution and associated with heightened marine productivity. OAE1b spans the Aptian/Albian boundary ($113-109 Ma) and represents a protracted interval of dysoxia with multiple discrete black shales across parts of Tethys (including Mexico), while OAE1d developed across eastern and western Tethys and in other locales during the latest Albian ($99.5 Ma). Mineralized plankton experienced accelerated rates of speciation and extinction at or near the major Cretaceous OAEs, and strontium isotopic evidence suggests a possible link to times of rapid oceanic plateau formation and/or increased rates of ridge crest volcanism. Elevated levels of trace metals in OAE1a and OAE2 strata suggest that marine productivity may have been facilitated by increased availability of dissolved iron. The association of plankton turnover and carbon isotopic excursions with each of the major OAEs, despite the variable geographic distribution of black shale accumulation, points to widespread changes in the ocean-climate system. Ocean crust production and hydrothermal activity increased in the late Aptian. Faster spreading rates [and/or increased ridge length] drove a long-term (Albian-early Turonian) rise in sea level and CO 2 -induced global warming. Changes in ocean circulation, water column stratification, and nutrient partitioning lead to a reorganization of plankton community structure and widespread carbonate (chalk) deposition during the Late Cretaceous. We conclude that there were important linkages between submarine volcanism, plankton evolution, and the cycling of carbon through the marine biosphere.

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A major planktic foraminiferal species turnover accompanied by a dramatic reduction in shell size, a fundamental change in shell architecture, and a precipitous drop in the abundance of planktic relative to benthic species occurs across the Aptian/Albian boundary interval (AABI) at globally distributed deep-sea sections. Extinction of the large and distinctive planktic foraminifer Paraticinella eubejaouaensis, used to denote a level at or near the Aptian/ Albian boundary, coincides with the extinctions of relatively long-ranging

The Neogene biostratigraphy presented here is based on the study of 230 samples through 737 m of pelagic sediment in Hole 806B. Sediment accumulation is interrupted only once in the uppermost lower Miocene (Zone N6), apparently coincident with a widespread deep-sea hiatus. Preservation of planktonic foraminifers through the section ranges from good to moderately poor. One hundred and ten species of planktonic foraminifers were identified; taxonomic notes on most species are included. All of the standard low-latitude Neogene foraminiferal zones are delineated, with the exceptions of Zones N8 and N9 because of a high first occurrence of Orbulina, and Zones N18 and N19 because of a high first occurrence of Sphaeroidinella dehiscens.Good agreement exists between the published account of the variation in planktonic foraminiferal species richness and the rates of diversification and turnover, and measurements of these evolutionary indexes in the record of Hole 806B. The global pattern of change in tropical/transitional species richness is paralleled in Hole 806B, with departures caused by either ecological conditions peculiar to the western equatorial Pacific or by inexactness in the estimation of million-year intervals in Hole 806B.Temporal changes in the relative abundance of taxa in the sediment assemblages, considered in light of their depth habitats, reveal a detailed picture of historical change in the structure of the upper water column over the Ontong Java Plateau. The dominance of surface dwellers (Paragloborotalia kugleri, P. mayeri, Dentoglobigerina altispira, Globigerinita glutinata, and Globigerinoides spp.) throughout the lower and middle Miocene is replaced by a more equitable distribution of surface (D. altispira and Globigerinoides spp.), intermediate {Globorotalia menardii plexus), and deep (Streptochilus spp.) dwellers in the late Miocene, following the closing of the Indo-Pacific Seaway and the initiation of large-scale glaciation in the Antarctic. The shoaling of the thermocline along the equator engendered by these climatic and tectonic events persisted through the Pliocene, when initial increases in the abundance of a new set of shallow, intermediate, and deep dwelling species of planktonic foraminifers coincide with the closing of the Panamanian Seaway.

New biostratigraphic data suggest, for the first time, that the long Aptian-Albian Oceanic Anoxic Event was marked by at least three distinct, relatively brief episodes of widespread dysoxia/anoxia which interrupted generally oxygenated conditions. The high-resolution, integrated foraminiferal and nannofossil biostratigraphy derived here allows recognition of an apparently ocean-wide dysoxic/anoxic episode in the early Aptian (Globigerinelloides blowi foraminiferal Zone, Chiastozygus litterarius nannofossil Zone, Conusphaera rothii nannofossil Subzone, shortly after magnetic Chron CMO). Equally widespread, but distributionally patchier dysoxic/anoxic episodes occurred in the early Albian (Hedbergella planispira foraminiferal Zone, Prediscosphaera colurnnata nannofossil Zone, subzone NC8B) and early late Albian (Biticinella breggiensis foraminiferal Zone, Axopodorhabdus albianus nannofossil Zone, subzone NC9B). These episodes can be best recognized in highly carbonaceous sediments deposited in epicontinental basins, now exposed on land, including the lower Aptian "Liven° Seth" of the Italian Apennines, the lower Albian "Niveau Paquier" of the Fosse Vocontienne, France, and the lower upper Albian Toolebuc Formation of the Eromanga Basin, Queensland, Australia. Our data indicate that these horizons correlate at the nannofossil subzonal level to carbonaceous intervals in DSDP/ODP sites which were deposited in pelagic and hemipelagic oceanic settings.Although none of these episodes is associated with major biotic extinctions, they are characterized by changes, of variable magnitude, in the community structure of planktonic foraminifera, which commonly consist of a low-diversity assemblage of opportunistic taxa or are entirely absent. Nannofossil taxa in these horizons do not change as radically, but in some sites show marked nearshore affinities or, in other sequences, are possibly replaced by other phytoplankton. Dissolution events cannot be entirely ruled out as a cause of some of the changes in calcareous biota. The proposed dysoxic/anoxic episodes appear to correlate with sea level transgressions or highstands. Rising sea level and climatic consequences of volcanism conditioned the oceans to be prone to dysoxia/anoxia. The spatial and sedimentological variability of organic carbon-rich intervals, and the fact that at least two of them have a patchy geographic distribution, indicate that regional or local climatic, tectonic or oceanographic factors induced or triggered dysoxia/anoxia.

Oscillations in ice sheet extent during early and middle Miocene are intermittently preserved in the sedimentary record from the Antarctic continental shelf, with widespread erosion occurring during major ice sheet advances, and open marine deposition during times of ice sheet retreat. Data from seismic reflection surveys and drill sites from Deep Sea Drilling Project Leg 28 and International Ocean Discovery Program Expedition 374, located across the present-day middle continental shelf of the central Ross Sea (Antarctica), indicate the presence of expanded early to middle Miocene sedimentary sections. These include the Miocene climate optimum (MCO ca. 17−14.6 Ma) and the middle Miocene climate transition (MMCT ca. 14.6−13.9 Ma). Here, we correlate drill core records, wireline logs and reflection seismic data to elucidate the depositional architecture of the continental shelf and reconstruct the evolution and variability of dynamic ice sheets in the Ross Sea during the Miocene. Drill-site data are used to constrain seismic isopach maps that document the evolution of different ice sheets and ice caps which influenced sedimentary processes in the Ross Sea through the early to middle Miocene. In the early Miocene, periods of localized advance of the ice margin are revealed by the formation of thick sediment wedges prograding into the basins. At this time, morainal bank complexes are distinguished along the basin margins suggesting sediment supply derived from marine-terminating glaciers. During the MCO, biosiliceous-bearing sediments are regionally mapped within the depocenters of the major sedimentary basin across the Ross Sea, indicative of widespread open marine deposition with reduced glacimarine influence. At the MMCT, a distinct erosive surface is interpreted as representing large-scale marine-based ice sheet advance over most of the Ross Sea paleo-continental shelf. The regional mapping of the seismic stratigraphic architecture and its correlation to drilling data indicate a regional transition through the Miocene from growth of ice caps and inland ice sheets with marine-terminating margins, to widespread marine-based ice sheets extending across the outer continental shelf in the Ross Sea.

Neogene ocean history is dominated by the theme of stepwise global cooling (with occasional reversals); the main trends of carbonate sedimentation on the Ontong Java Plateau show the regional response of productivity, dissolution, winnowing, and redeposition to this overall climatic change. The relative importance of these processes in controlling accumulation rates and carbonate content is difficult to assess for any given place and time. Thus, the outstanding feature of the carbonate record, the Tortonian-Messinian accumulation rate peak centered in the latest Miocene (maximum sedimentation rate >60 m/m.y.), is the product of a complex interplay of a general late Miocene to early Pliocene productivity maximum combined with increased mechanical and chemical erosion before and after the peak. The mix of erosional factors depends on the depth level considered and changes with time. Increased productivity apparently derives from high nutrient content in Pacific deep waters, caused by increased production of North Atlantic Deep Water (NADW) in the latest Miocene and basin-basin fractionation. Enhancement of the thermocline strength is indicated at that time from an increase in planktonic foraminifers living at intermediate depths. A fundamental change in the mode of productivity (toward pulsed productivity?) is indicated by changes in the coccolith flora.The main focus of this study is the definition of major patterns of sedimentation and associated open questions, as follows:1. Carbonate records are parallel over a wide depth range. Does this mean that dissolution is also important on the upper plateau? Or is there a "conspiracy" of separate factors acting in concert?2. Dissolution of carbonate cannot explain both carbonate and sedimentation rate patterns. The "loss paradox*' arises from the fact that carbonate percentages at different depths are so similar that the differences in carbonate are insufficient to account for differences in sedimentation rate, assuming that dissolution produces these differences.3. Equatorial crossings have little or no effect on carbonate content or sedimentation rate. "Equatorial insensitivity" indicates that equatorial upwelling is of subordinate importance in biogenic sedimentation on the plateau in the late Neogene (as is the case today).4. There is evidence for a general insensitivity of both carbonate and sedimentation rate records with regard to global changes in conditions, as seen in commonly used proxies. Changes in δ 18 θ of benthic foraminifers, for example, and sea-level changes (as mapped by sequence stratigraphy) are not clearly correlated with the main parameters of Neogene carbonate sedimentation on the plateau. Correspondence to the δ 3 C record is somewhat better, however. Proxies may be ill defined, or the regional overprint may obscure global relationships.The issues listed above are of a very general nature. Without a successful attack on these questions, the major patterns of carbonate sedimentation on the plateau will remain enigmatic, as will many phe...

Microfossils from Cretaceous coal-bearing strata can be used to establish key stratigraphic surfaces that mark marine flooding events with intermediate-frequency (fourth-order) and high-frequency (fifth-order) periodicities. We document several examples of this cyclicity from the transgressive and regressive facies at the land-sea transition of the Greenhorn Marine Cycle on the Colorado Plateau. Estuarine strata from the upper Cenomanian Dakota and middle Turonian Straight Cliffs Formations yield four primary fossil assemblages: Assemblage A, the lagoonal assemblage, comprising a rich agglutinated foraminiferal population of Trochammina and Verneuilinoides and brackish ostracodes and molluscs in a skeletal shell accumulation; Assemblage B, the proximal estuarine assemblage, comprising the brackish ostracode Fossocytheridea, charophytes, and smooth admetopsid gastropods within bituminous coal zones giving rise to distal estuary with the addition of brackish gastropods and sparse agglutinated foraminifera in sandy marlstones; Assemblage C, the open-bay (distal estuarine) assemblage, comprising the ostracodes Fossocytheridea posterovata, Cytheromorpha, Looneyella, and Cytheropteron, the foraminifera Trochammina and Ammobaculites, and ornate brackish molluscs in calcareous shelly mudstones; and Assemblage D, the marsh, comprising an exclusive population of the foraminifera Trochammina, Miliammina, and Ammobaculites in rooted lignites. Intermediate flooding surfaces are marked by normal marine taxa that are superimposed on the background of a primary marginal marine assemblage. In general, intermediate flooding events approximate lithologic and biostratigraphic boundaries and record basin-wide paleoenvironmental changes with the advancing Greenhorn Sea. We correlate coal zones from the coast to maxima in calcium carbonate and planktic foraminifera in the offshore. The intermediate cycles approximate ammonite biostratigraphic zones and therefore maintain periodicities within the 100-400 kyr bandwidth. The onshore-offshore correlations suggest that a regional and perhaps global sea-level mechanism controlled the stratigraphic position of the coal zones. Superimposed on the intermediate cycles are higher-frequency cycles that represent short-lived flooding events. As many as six high-frequency cycles constitute an intermediate cycle, and therefore periodicities fall within an approximate 10-25 kyr range. The general asymmetry of the packages suggests that a combination of oceanographic, climatic, and autogenic processes influenced the high-frequency stratal architecture. Overall, the primary mechanism controlling the stratigraphic position of the coals was tectono-eustasy. Compactional processes and/or climate modulations contributed to the observed internal coalzone cyclicity that we interpret as a secondary coal-forming process.