Age and growth rates of ferromanganese concretions from the gulf of Finland derived from 210Pb measurements

Abstract

The formation of ferromanganese concretions on continental shelves is a widespread recent biogeochemical process, which is particularly intense in the Baltic Sea. The proposed new technique for dating ferromanganese concretions is based on the equilibrium 210Pb, which is produced immediately within them due to the decay of 226Ra, which is intensely sorbed by concretions from the seawater. This method is principally different from the traditional dating of bottom sediments using nonequilibrium 210Pb, which represents a decay product of atmospheric Ra. A mathematical tool for the calculation of the concretion ages is proposed. The latter is used for calculating the ages and growth rates of ferromanganese concretions belonging to two morphological varieties. The age and average growth rates of spheroidal concretions are estimated to be 670–850 years and 0.014 mm/year, respectively. The central part of a pancake-shaped concretion is dated back to 2500–3800 years, and its calculated respective horizontal and vertical growth rates are approximately 0.028 and 0.004 mm/year.