Magnetic fabrics of arc plutons reveal a significant Late Jurassic to Early Cretaceous change in the relative plate motions of the Pacific Ocean basin and North America

The Pacific Ocean is the world's largest and deepest ocean, spanning about one-third of the earth's surface. Despite its size, the Pacific has received only scant global historical attention when compared to the Atlantic and the Indian Oceans. However, the Pacific has played a prominent role intermittently in world history, highlighted by Austronesian expansion, Manila Galleon trade, eighteenth-century European exploration, and the intense island-hopping military campaigns of World War II. At the same time, such historical interest did not translate into a familiar timeline integrating this watery geographical feature into a larger world historical framework. This article argues that there is more discontinuity than continuity to this ocean, and its history is best broken down by three distinct periods of exploration and settlement.

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RUSSKIE OTKR'ITIIA V TIKHOM OKEANE I SEVERNOI AMERIKE V XVII-XIX VEKAKH. Russian Discoveries in the Pacific Ocean and North America in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries

Geographical Journal ◽

10.2307/1789220 ◽

1947 ◽

Vol 110 (1/3) ◽

pp. 124

Author(s):

S. I. T. ◽

A. I. Andreev

Keyword(s):

Pacific Ocean ◽

North America ◽

The Pacific ◽

The Pacific Ocean ◽

Eighteenth And Nineteenth Centuries

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Distributions of millimeter-wave cloud radar reflectivity observed over North America and the Pacific Ocean

IGARSS '98. Sensing and Managing the Environment. 1998 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing. Symposium Proceedings. (Cat. No.98CH36174) ◽

10.1109/igarss.1998.702820 ◽

1998 ◽

Author(s):

G.A. Sadowy ◽

S.M. Sekelsky ◽

F.K. Li

Keyword(s):

Pacific Ocean ◽

North America ◽

Millimeter Wave ◽

Radar Reflectivity ◽

Cloud Radar ◽

The Pacific ◽

The Pacific Ocean

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A journal of voyages and travels in the interiour of North America : between the 47th and 58th degrees of north latitude, extending from Montreal nearly to the Pacific Ocean, a distance of about 5,000 miles, including an account of the principal occurrences, during a residence of nineteen years, in different parts of the country : to which are added, a concise description of the face of the country, its inhabitants, their manners, customs, laws, religion, etc. and considerable specimens of the two languages, most extensively spoken; together with an account of the principal animals, to be found in the forests and prairies of this extensive region : illustrated by a map of the country /

10.5962/bhl.title.82391 ◽

1820 ◽

Author(s):

Daniel Williams Harmon ◽

Daniel Haskel

Keyword(s):

Pacific Ocean ◽

North America ◽

Extensive Region ◽

The Pacific ◽

The Face ◽

The Pacific Ocean ◽

Different Parts ◽

Concise Description ◽

North Latitude

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Cretaceous Black Shales in the Pacific: The Equatorial Position Hypothesis

10.5194/egusphere-egu21-10135 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Max J. Bouwmeester ◽

Lydian Boschman ◽

Nienke Berends ◽

Jeremy D. Owens ◽

Ben C. Gill ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Pacific Ocean ◽

Organic Carbon ◽

Ocean Basin ◽

Black Shales ◽

Equatorial Position ◽

Scientific Drilling ◽

Geochemical Evidence ◽

The Pacific ◽

The Pacific Ocean ◽

Oceanic Anoxia

Although anoxia is rare in modern oceans, the marine stratigraphic record is punctuated by sedimentary and geochemical evidence for episodes of widespread oceanic anoxia. The last time in Earth history that a large volume of the ocean became anoxic was in the middle Cretaceous: black organic-carbon-rich muds were repeatedly preserved on the deep seafloor during oceanic anoxic events (OAEs).Sedimentary and geochemical evidence for oceanic anoxia during OAEs comes mainly from the Atlantic and Tethys Oceans. Data from the Pacific Ocean, which was the largest ocean basin in the middle Cretaceous, is scarce and equivocal. Based on black shales deposited at depths of about 500&#8211;1500 m on seamounts, Monteiro et al. (2012) have suggested that at least 50 vol% of the ocean was anoxic at the climax of Cretaceous oceanic anoxia during the late Cenomanian. They also included a single black shale at DSDP Site 585 in the Mariana Basin as evidence for anoxia in the deep Pacific. We will show, however, that this is a mud turbidite reworked from shallower water.For this study, we reviewed all available data and publications from scientific drilling that recovered Cretaceous sediments in the Pacific Ocean. The little available Cretaceous record from the Pacific consists mainly of well-oxidized sediments. The exceptions are black shales that occur at depths of about 500&#8211;1500 m on seamounts. Takashima et al. (2011) have shown that the Asian and North American continental margins of the Pacific were indeed oxic for most of the late Cenomanian OAE.&#160;We used a new paleomagnetic reconstruction of the Pacific plate back to 150 Ma to show that all investigated Cretaceous organic-carbon-rich sediments in the Pacific Ocean were deposited while the site was located in the Equatorial Divergence Zone (10&#176;S to 10&#176;N). We therefore argue that organic matter deposition in the Pacific Ocean might not have been directly related to OAEs, but rather be associated with the passage of seamounts beneath the equatorial belt of high productivity.Several authors have challenged suggestions that OAEs were characterized by globally pervasive anoxic deep water and pointed to the difficulty in sustaining whole-ocean anoxia, even in warm oceans. We agree and our results show that oceanic anoxia in the Pacific is a local phenomenon superposed on a global trend of expanded oxygen minima in the ocean.

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