Paleoclimate reconstructions need better age models

Timing is important for comprehending Earth's biological and climatic processes shaping evolution, extinction, and recovery. Causes and consequences of changing climate can be unraveled only if geological proxy data from different regions are synchronized in time so that causality arguments can be tested rigorously. Many key climate proxy records of the last 100 million years come from deep ocean sediments, but they are currently not sufficiently synchronized across regions on Milankovitch cycle level. The acquisition of accurate chronological data that allow for synchronization across regions is of paramount importance for meaningful interpretations of proxy records.

Here we make the case to form an international coordination network to synchronize regional climate records of the last 100 million years. This network will contribute to revise and recalibrate the dating tools available to paleoclimatologists - that is, the local and regional information obtained from bio-, magneto-, and chemo-stratigraphy as well as radioisotopic geochronology - with the synchronizing tool of astrochronology. Cross-fertilization of expertise is needed to generate new age models for sediment records from which key climate events have been or can be reconstructed, including micropaleontological studies of scientific ocean drilling legacy material. We invite the scientific community to recognize this shortcoming, to join our efforts, and to help raise funds to make the envisaged Time Integrated Matrix for Earth Sciences (TIMES) program a reality.