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Nature 437, 39-41 (1 September 2005) | doi:10.1038/437039a; Published online 31 August 2005

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Palaeoclimate: The riddle of the sediments

Mark Siddall1

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The ratio of oxygen isotopes contained in the signal in deep-sea sediments can tell us a great deal about past ice-volume variations. The challenge is to disentangle the different contributions to the signal.

The ratio of ice to water on Earth has been in more-or-less constant flux on timescales of thousands to millions of years. Although we have known of these changes for several decades, quantifying them — finding whether Earth's climate has laid down a precise account of itself anywhere — continues to preoccupy palaeoceanographers, palaeoclimatologists and glaciologists alike.

  1. Mark Siddall is in the Department of Climate and Environmental Physics, University of Bern, Sidlerstrasse 5, 3012 Bern, Switzerland.
    Email: siddall@climate.unibe.ch

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