Open AccessRadiocarbon: A key tracer for studying Earth’s dynamo, climate system, carbon cycle, and Sun
Author(s) -
Timothy Heaton,
Édouard Bard,
Christopher Bronk Ramsey,
Martin Butzin,
Peter Köhler,
Raimund Muscheler,
Paula Reimer,
Lukas Wacker
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 12.556
H-Index - 1186
eISSN - 1095-9203
pISSN - 0036-8075
DOI - 10.1126/science.abd7096
Subject(s) - radiocarbon dating , carbon cycle , tracer , earth system science , environmental science , atmosphere (unit) , calibration , diurnal cycle , earth science , climatology , atmospheric sciences , geology , meteorology , geography , paleontology , physics , oceanography , ecology , ecosystem , nuclear physics , biology , quantum mechanics
Using carbon-14 Carbon-14 or radiocarbon, a radioactive isotope produced in the upper atmosphere by cosmic rays, is rapidly incorporated into the terrestrial carbon cycle and provides a way to calculate the age of carbon-bearing materials as old as 55,000 years. Heatonet al . review recent progress that has allowed the construction of better radiocarbon age calibration curves and discuss the new insights into climate processes, the Sun, Earth’s geodynamo, and the carbon cycle that have emerged from these efforts. —HJS
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