Radiocarbon Results from a 13-kyr BP Coral from the Huon Peninsula, Papua New Guinea

Abstract

This paper presents radiocarbon results from a single Goniastrea favulus coral from Papua New Guinea which lived continuously between 13.0 and 13.1 kyr BP. The specimen was collected from a drill core on the Huon Peninsula and has been independently dated with 230Th. A site-specific reservoir correction has been applied to the results, and coral growth bands were used to calibrate individual growth years. Alternating density bands, which are the result of seasonal growth variations, were subsampled to provide 2 integrated 6-month 14C measurements per year. This allows for 20 independent measurements to be averaged for each decadal value of the 14C calibration, making these results the highest resolution data set available for this brief time range. The fine structure of the data set exhibits 14C oscillations with frequencies on the order of 4 to 10 yr, similar to those observed in modern coral 14C records.