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| Quaternary geology of the United States | |
|---|---|
| Name | Quaternary geology of the United States |
| Caption | Extent of Pleistocene glaciation in North America |
| Period | Quaternary |
| Region | United States |
| Type | Geology |
Quaternary geology of the United States The Quaternary geology of the United States examines stratigraphic successions, glacial history, surficial deposits, and paleoenvironments from the Pleistocene to the Holocene across the United States and adjoining regions such as Canada and Mexico, integrating evidence from glacial mapping by the United States Geological Survey, paleoecological studies associated with the Smithsonian Institution, and climate reconstructions linked to cores from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. This field synthesizes work by institutions like the Geological Society of America, researchers at the University of Minnesota, and field programs coordinated with the U.S. National Park Service to constrain chronostratigraphy, landscape evolution, and faunal turnover tied to events such as the Last Glacial Maximum and the Younger Dryas.
Quaternary chronostratigraphy in the United States follows global subdivisions recognized by the International Commission on Stratigraphy and regional frameworks developed by the United States Geological Survey, linking stage names like Pleistocene and Holocene with regional units such as the Wisconsin glaciation and the Illinoian glaciation, and integrating biostratigraphic benchmarks from assemblages recorded by the American Museum of Natural History and radiometric data from laboratories at Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Correlations use marker beds such as the Mazama ash from Mount Mazama and paleomagnetic excursions correlated with work at the University of California, Berkeley and the Paleomagnetism Laboratory to synchronize terrestrial records with marine isotope stages defined via the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and the Lamont-Doherty record of Marine isotope stage 2.
The dynamics of Laurentide, Cordilleran, and smaller alpine ice masses are reconstructed from landforms mapped by the United States Geological Survey, process studies referencing glaciological theory from Louis Agassiz-inspired glaciology and numeric modeling at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, and cosmogenic-nuclide exposure ages produced in collaboration with researchers at University of Colorado Boulder and University of Washington. Work on ice-stream behavior and retreat documented at sites like the Great Lakes basin, the Channeled Scablands, and the St. Lawrence corridor draws on sedimentological analyses by teams at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and mapping initiatives supported by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration using imagery from Landsat and ICESat.
Regional syntheses describe loess provinces along the Mississippi River, glaciofluvial terraces in the Rocky Mountains, and coastal barrier systems along the Atlantic Coast and Pacific Northwest, with stratigraphic frameworks developed by the Ohio State University, the University of Oregon, and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. Notable deposits include the loess of the Missouri River valley, the outwash of the River Thames-analogous Pleistocene systems studied by comparative work at the University of Minnesota Duluth, and marsh peat sequences from the Chesapeake Bay region investigated by the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center and the USGS Coastal and Marine Geology Program.
Quaternary paleoclimate reconstructions rely on proxy records from lacustrine cores from the Great Salt Lake and Mono Lake, speleothems from caves studied by the National Speleological Society, and marine cores retrieved with collaboration from the International Ocean Discovery Program and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution to document shifts during events like the Bølling–Allerød interstadial and the Younger Dryas. Sea-level histories along the Gulf Coast, the Pacific Coast, and the New England shoreline integrate relative sea-level curves produced by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and paleotidal reconstructions tied to Holocene isostatic rebound modeled with inputs from the University of Alaska Fairbanks and the Geological Survey of Canada.
Quaternary geomorphology addresses glacial scouring, drumlin fields in New York (state), morainal complexes in Michigan, and arroyo dynamics in the Southwest United States, supported by process geomorphology research at the University of Arizona and mapping by the National Park Service at sites such as Yellowstone National Park and Grand Canyon National Park. Fluvial responses to deglaciation, periglacial features studied in Alaska, and permafrost distribution analyzed by the Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory highlight interactions among climate, sediment transport, and tectonics, with applications for hazard assessment by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Faunal turnover, megafaunal extinctions, and biogeographic shifts are documented through vertebrate paleontology collections at the Smithsonian Institution and the American Museum of Natural History, field sites like the La Brea Tar Pits, and paleoecological studies of pollen and macrofossils archived at the Ohio State University. Analyses of proboscidean remains, Pleistocene megafauna such as Mammuthus and Bison antiquus, and vertebrate assemblages from the Pleistocene/Holocene transition employ taphonomic studies by researchers at the University of Florida and isotopic work undertaken at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology through international collaboration.
Methodological advances include radiocarbon dating developed with laboratories at the University of Arizona and accelerator mass spectrometry centers, optically stimulated luminescence dating refined at the University of Oxford and applied by groups at the University of Texas at Austin, cosmogenic-nuclide techniques advanced at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich and implemented in US studies at Princeton University, and stratigraphic correlation frameworks advanced by the United States Geological Survey and the Geological Society of America. The history of Quaternary research in the United States traces contributions from figures such as Grove Karl Gilbert and William Morris Davis to institutional programs at the National Science Foundation and contemporary synthesis efforts led by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change-informed climate community.