Quartz OSL dating of late quaternary Chinese and Serbian loess: A cross Eurasian comparison of dust mass accumulation rates

Reconstructing dust Mass Accumulation Rate (MAR) from loess deposits is critical to understanding past atmospheric mineral dust activity and requires accurate independent age models from loess deposits across Europe and Asia. Previous correlations of loess in Europe and China have tended to focus on multi-millennial timescales, with no detailed examination of dust MAR at the two ends of the Eurasian loess belt on shorter, sub-orbital scales.

Here we present a detailed quartz optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) chronology from the Serbian Titel Loess Plateau (Veliki Surduk loess core) and the Chinese Loess Plateau (Lingtai section). The luminescence ages pass internal tests and show consistent increases in age with depth, with no obvious major hiatuses.

However, as reported before, it seems the quartz OSL technique is only capable of accurate age determination up to accrued doses of ca. 150 Gy (ca. 30-40 ka) due to approaching field saturation of the quartz OSL signal. Two age-depth models were used to reconstruct dust MARs, where one utilises OSL data solely and the other additionally makes assumptions about sedimentation rates.

Although short-term fluctuations in MAR are model dependent, general MAR patterns between the two sites are very similar, with peak MAR occurring rather late in the last glacial (ca. 13-25 ka). This suggests that at least broad scale trends in dust activity within the last glacial period may be similar at a continental scale.