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The 2011 Tohoku-oki earthquake and tsunami was the most destructive geohazard in Japanese history. However, little is known of the past recurrence of large earthquakes along the Japan Trench. Deep-sea turbidites are potential candidates for understanding the history of such earthquakes. Core samples were collected from three thick turbidite units on the Japan Trench floor near the epicenter of the 2011 event. The uppermost unit (Unit TT1) consists of amalgamated diatomaceous mud (30-60 cm thick) that deposited from turbidity currents triggered by shallow subsurface instability on the lower trench slope associated with strong ground motion during the 2011 Tohoku-oki earthquake. Older thick turbidite units (Units TT2 and TT3) also consist of several amalgamated subunits that contain thick sand layers in their lower parts. Sedimentological characteristics and tectonic and bathymetric settings of the Japan Trench floor indicate that these turbidites also originated from two older large earthquakes of potentially similar to the 2011 Tohoku-oki earthquake. A thin tephra layer between Units TT2 and TT3 constrains the age of these earthquakes. Geochemical analysis of volcanic glass shards within the tephra layer indicate that it is correlative to the Towada-a tephra (AD 915) from the Towada volcano in northeastern Japan. The stratigraphy of the Japan Trench turbidites resembles that of onshore tsunami deposits on the Sendai and Ishinomaki plains, indicating that the cored uppermost succession of the Japan Trench comprises a 1500-year-old record that includes the sedimentary fingerprint of the historical Jogan earthquake of AD 869.

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The Quaternary hemipelagic sediments of the Japan Sea are characterized by centimeter-to decimeter-scale alternation of dark and light clay to silty clay, which are bio-siliceous and/or bio-calcareous to a various degree. Each of the dark and light layers are considered as deposited synchronously throughout the deeper (> 500 m) part of the sea. However, attempts for correlation and age estimation of individual layers are limited to the upper few tens of meters. In addition, the exact timing of the depositional onset of these dark and light layers and its synchronicity throughout the deeper part of the sea have not been explored previously, although the onset timing was roughly estimated as~1.5 Ma based on the result of Ocean Drilling Program legs 127/128. Consequently, it is not certain exactly when their deposition started, whether deposition of dark and light layers was synchronous and whether they are correlatable also in the earlier part of their depositional history. The Quaternary hemipelagic sediments of the Japan Sea were drilled at seven sites during Integrated Ocean Drilling Program Expedition 346 in 2013. Alternation of dark and light layers was recovered at six sites whose water depths are >~900 m, and continuous composite columns were constructed at each site. Here, we report our effort to correlate individual dark layers and estimate their ages based on a newly constructed age model at Site U1424 using the best available paleomagnetic datum and marker tephras. The age model is further tuned to LR04 δ 18 O curve using gamma ray attenuation density (GRA) since it reflects diatom contents that are higher during interglacial high-stands. The constructed age model for Site U1424 is projected to other sites using correlation of dark layers to form a high-resolution and high-precision paleo-observatory network that allows to reconstruct changes in material fluxes with high spatio-temporal resolutions.

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Reliable estimates of evolutionary rates of mitochondrial DNA might allow us to build realistic evolutionary scenarios covering broad time scales based on phylogenetic inferences. In the present study, we sought to obtain estimates of evolutionary rates in murine rodents using calibrations against historical biogeographic events. We first assumed that land-bridge-like structures that appeared intermittently at glacial maxima with 100,000-year intervals shaped the divergence patterns of cytochrome b (Cytb) sequences (1140 bp) of the larger Japanese wood mouse Apodemus speciosus. The comparison of sequences from peripheral remote islands that are separated from one another by deep straits allowed us to estimate mitochondrial DNA evolutionary rates (substitutions/site/million years) to be 0.027 to 0.036, with presumed calibrations from 140,000, 250,000, 350,000, and 440,000 years ago. Second, we addressed rapid expansion events inferred from analyses of the Cytb sequences of the lesser Japanese wood mouse A. argenteus. We detected five expansion signals in the dataset and established three categories based on the expansion parameter tau values: 3.9, 5.6-5.7, and 7.8-8.1. Considering that the climate became warmer 15,000, 53,000, and 115,000 years ago after preceding periods of rapid cooling, we calculated evolutionary rates to be 0.114, 0.047, and 0.031, respectively. This preliminary concept of the evolutionary rates on a time scale from 15,000 to 440,000 years ago for the wood mouse should be refined and tested in other species of murine rodents, including mice and rats.