Thirtieth Anniversary Meeting Curators of Marine & Lacustrine Geological Samples

1. Thirtieth Anniversary MeetingCurators of Marine & Lacustrine Geological Samples September 24-26, 2007 Aspen Lodge Estes Park, Colorado

2. Lamont-Doherty Earth ObservatoryDeep-Sea Sample Repository 58 years of coring the ocean floor

3. Locations of cores in the Lamont collection. Each dot on the map represents where a core was taken and archived in the Lamont Repository. Some of the cores have been so heavily sampled that only "residuals" of sediment remain, or data resulting from work on the cores.

4. Core Repository Collection

5. A brief history Lamont’s first Core Respository was the dining room of the elegant Lamont mansion. All cores were stored dry in the LDEO exclusive 8’ trays, dining room temperature.

6. Overflow was “temporarily” moved to the ground level of the Lamont Estate Carriage House which was being used as a garage by a Lamont scientist. The arrangement became permanent, and the garage became Lamont’s first official Core Repository.

7. The present-day Core Laboratory housing the Core Repository.

8. Cores were split, photographed and described from the beginning (in the dining room). AT150-1 from Ewing’s epiphanic MAR cruise, 1947.

9. Megascopic Description and photo of Core VM2-1 taken in 1953.

10. Recently archived core: LWB1-12 The original concept is still in place. Continuity is the LDEO long suit.

11. The Shipboard Core Log has been formalized. Additional work on cores is archived.

12. Archiving cores has been consistent Cores are split in half lengthwise. Pipes are grooved with a router, then split using a hook-style utility blade. The sediment is cut through using piano wire.

13. Cores are photographed with a Fuji digital camera. Images stored as tiff for archive and jpeg for web. Hard copy printed for Core Logs. Photography is now digital color Thanks to The NOAA Climate Data Modernization Program (CDMP) and NGDC, all LDEO analog photos have been digitized and are being placed on-line.

14. Cores are megascopically described. Sampling for non-LDEO researchers.

15. Storage has been consistent. Dry storage trays: galvanized steel, 2.5” wide, 8 feet long. Racks are 9 ft tall, each holds 704 trays.

16. Storage of dry cores

17. Wet tray storage began in 1985 -- 5 foot long, mostly 4.5” wide D-tubes. Racks are custom built, 10 ft tall. Each holds 296 trays. There are various widths and lengths of cores requiring many different storage systems.

18. Refrigerated storage of wet cores

19. Residuals storage Unused or returned processed sample material is stored in hundreds of drawers installed wherever we can squeeze them in. There are close to 200,000 of these samples filed, most catalogued and on the web. For many older cores, only residuals remain for sampling.

20. RepositoryFacilities Analog data is stored in nearly 1,000 ring binders dating to 1947. In addition to archive storage, the Repository facilities consist of a large laboratory, office and core library, physical properties lab, 2 technical offices, cutting/sampling room, X-radiography room, storage, and core splitting/photography area.

21. Metadata Management • All core data in analog format (Core Logs) • 58 years of core data digitized • Metadata sent to NGDC • Metadata being entered into new System for Earth Sample Registration (SESAR) • Metadata including Megascopic Descriptions available on LDEO Web and NGDC • Core Sample History being entered on LDEO Web • all core photos in digital format • Results of work on material available on WEB via GEOMAPAPP and/or NGDC

22. Lamont Coring Facts • ~85% of the collection was taken by 1979, driven by Ewing’s “A-Core-a-Day” dictum. • ~70% of the collection was taken when both VEMA and CONRAD were coring from 1962 through 1979. • Most of the above cores were destined to be archived and stored, unsampled, waiting for the day they would be called upon.

23. What have we been doing with all those cores all these years?

25. Half of all samples currently distributed are from older, dry cores. VM29-191, North Atlantic, 1972

26. Sampling in earlier days was at coarser intervals such as 20 or 50 cm. Large chunks taken for samples. LamontSampling Facts High sampling rate in 70’s and early 80’s due to CLIMAP and SPECMAP projects. Most present-day sampling is high- resolution, as close as 1/2 cm intervals, small amount.

27. Recording of sampling has been continuous. Sample history is available on-line for samples taken as early as 1960. More added as time is available.

28. Record of core taken in 1948 -- metadata and sample history Lamont’s first cores are from the ATLANTIS by way of an arrangement Ewing had with Woods Hole.

29. A few reasons to be thankful these cores have been continuously archived, and available -- Cores taken in 1954 from Gulf of Mexico never sampled until five years ago have now been used by several researchers. Cores taken in 1971 and 1972 from North Atlantic never sampled before 1990’s are now high-volume sampled cores. Cores from Pacific taken over many years and never sampled are now used for cosmic impact studies. And more…

30. The Lamont material collected for over 50 years is irreplaceable. The high quality of archiving has been consistent. The collection is well-known world-wide because of the availability of data and open policy for sampling. KN158-4-22GGC

31. Win-win for both funding agencies and researchers Finding a suite of unsampled or lightly sampled cores suitable for someone’s work is like getting a free cruise. Core VM28-68 taken 1970 near Reykjanes Ridge

32. Plans for the future

33. Enhance data mining and visualization for users to simplify and improve use of legacy data. We plan to begin processing of detailed descriptions into a tabulated format so that barrel sheets will be generated automatically including carbonate contents, photos, sensor track measurements, paleomagnetics, isotope measurements, etc.

34. Expansion of the Lamont core Database to include searches for published cores, by coordinate and other known data. Location of cores in the Repository that have been cited in journal and book publications, visualized in the GeoMapApp browser (www.geomapapp.org). This figure shows 9,665 citations to individual cores between 1953 and 1999. The dot color in the map is coded to year of publication.

35. Greater involvement with SESAR in assigning every item in the Repository a unique identifier

36. Provide reconnaissance CaCO3 measurements on as-yet un-sampled cores that have promise as excellent archives of past climate change in order to promote their use by the scientific community.

37. Continued curation of the collection, addition of new cores and dredges, and maintenance of storage facilities and equipment.

38. Processing samples for researchers and undertaking non-destructive measurements on cores based on user requests.