Study: Marker For Current Geological Era Found In Japan
Researchers say an area of southwestern Japan is one step closer to selection as the part of the world that best defines our current unit of geological time.
Beppu Bay in Oita Prefecture is one of 12 sites being considered as the Global Stratotype Section and Point for Anthropocene, the unofficial period when human activity started impacting the environment.
A key indicator of the period could be plutonium, which has been used as a mid-20th-century time-marker in various geological archives.
Researchers from the University of Tokyo and Ehime University say sedimentary records from Beppu Bay show a clear increase in the radioactive element from 1950. They say it peaked during the 1960s, and then declined after nuclear tests were restricted.
The group is led by Professor Yokoyama Yusuke of the University of Tokyo. He says he hopes assigning a specific location to Anthropocene will deepen discussions on how people and nature can coexist as the effects of climate change grow more severe.