Quantifying regolith erosion rates with cosmogenic nuclides 10Be and 26Al in the McMurdo Dry Valleys, Antarctica

Abstract

The McMurdo Dry Valleys, Antarctica (MDV) are among the oldest landscapes on Earth, and some landforms there present an intriguing apparent contradiction such that millions of years old surface deposits maintain their meter-scale morphology despite the fact that measured erosion rates are 0.1-4 m Ma -1. We analyzed the concentration of cosmic ray-produced 10Be and 26Al in quartz sands from regolith directly above and below two well-documented ash deposits in the MDV, the Arena Valley ash (40Ar/39Ar age of 4.33 Ma) and the Hart ash (K-Ar age of 3.9 Ma). Measured concentrations of 10Be and 26Al are significantly less than expected given the age of the in situ air fall ashes and are best interpreted as reflecting the degradation rate of the overlying sediments. The erosion rate of the material above the Arena Valley ash that best explains the observed isotope profiles is 3.5 ± 0.41 × 10 -5 g cm-2 yr-1 (∼0.19 m Ma-1) for the past ∼4 Ma. For the Hart ash, the erosion rate is 4.8 ± 0.21 × 10-4 g cm-2 yr-1 (∼2.6 m Ma -1) for the past ∼1 Ma. The concentration profiles do not show signs of mixing, creep, or deflation caused by sublimation of ground ice. These results indicate that the slow, steady lowering of the surface without vertical mixing may allow landforms to maintain their meter-scale morphology even though they are actively eroding. Copyright 2010 by the American Geophysical Union.