University of Glasgow helps sharpen focus of radiocarbon dating

Scientists at the University of Glasgow have used sediment from the bottom of a Japanese lake to calibrate more effectively the tools used to determine the age of ancient materials. Charlotte Bryant, head of the Natural Environment Research Council Radiocarbon Facility at the Scottish Universities Environmental Research Centre (SUERC) was part of a team of researchers who examined samples from the bed of Lake Suigetsu for a paper published in the journal Science . SUERC is a collaborative facility operated jointly by the Universities of Glasgow and Edinburgh. A project led by Professor Takeshi Nakagawa of the University of Newcastle recovered sediment cores which preserve records of the lake and surrounding environment over the past 150,000 years. The sediment contains layers of tiny, relatively light-colored algae called diatoms, which sink to the floor of the lake each year, followed by a layer of darker sediments. The project set out to use leaves preserved within the sediment to refine the atmospheric radiocarbon record. Radiocarbon, or C-14, is a naturally occurring, radioactive isotope of carbon that decays at a known, constant rate.