Sites 1147 (18°50.11´N, 116°33.28´E; water depth = 3246 m) and 1148 (18°50.17´N, 116°33.94´E; water depth = 3294 m) are located on the lowermost continental slope off southern China near the continent/ocean crust boundary of the South China Sea Basin. Site 1147 is located upslope ~0.45 nmi west of Site 1148. Three advanced piston corer holes at Site 1147 and two extended core barrel holes at Site 1148 were cored and combined into a composite (spliced) stratigraphic section, which provided a relatively continuous profile for the lower Oligocene to Holocene (Wang, Prell, Blum, et al., 2000; Jian, et al., 2001) for studying stratigraphy and paleoceanography. A total of 1047 planktonic foraminifers stable isotope measurements were performed on 975 samples covering the upper 409.58 meters composite depth (mcd) at ~42-cm intervals (Tables T1, T2), and a total of 1864 benthic foraminifers measurements were performed on 1650 samples in the upper 837.11 mcd at ~51-cm intervals (Tables T3, T4). We significantly improved the time resolution of the benthic stable isotope record in the upper 476.68 mcd by reducing the average sample spacing to ~29 cm. This translates into an average sampling resolution of ~16 k.y. for the Miocene sequence and ~8 k.y. for the Pliocene–Holocene interval, assuming a change in sedimentation rates from ~1.8 to ~3.5 cm/k.y., as suggested by shipboard stratigraphy. These data sets provide the basis for upcoming studies to establish an oxygen isotope stratigraphy and examine the Neogene evolution of deep and surface water signatures (temperature, salinity, and nutrients) in the South China Sea.
1Cheng, X., Zhao, Q., Wang, J., Jian, Z., Xia, P., Huang, B., Fang, D., Xu, J., Zhou, Z., and Wang, P., 2004. Data report: Stable isotopes from Sites 1147 and 1148. In Prell, W.L., Wang, P., Blum, P., Rea, D.K., and Clemens, S.C. (Eds.), Proc. ODP, Sci. Results, 184 [Online]. Available from World Wide Web: <http://www-odp.tamu.edu/publications/184_SR/223/223.htm>. [Cited YYYY-MM-DD]
2Laboratory of Marine Geology, Tongji University, 1239 Siping Road, Shanghai 200092, People's Republic of China. Correspondence author: xrchengk@online.sh.cn
Initial receipt: 18 December 2002
Acceptance: 23 October 2003
Web publication:
6 April 2004
Ms 184SR-223