Institution: | aDépartement de Préhistoire, Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, UMR 5198 du CNRS, 1 rue René Panhard, 75013 Paris, France bLaboratoire National Henri Becquerel, CEA/Saclay, 91191Gif-sur-Yvette, France |
Abstract: | The choice of the ESR signal in the dating of speleothems is still debated. Among the peaks observed in speleothem ESR spectra, the most frequently signals used for the determination of the palaeodoses are the peaks at g=2.0007 (h3 line), g=2.0040 (Broad Line) and g=2.0057 (h1 line). In order to determine the better analytical way to obtain reproducible DE values from these three ESR signals, successive additional annealing treatments ranging from 60–300 °C were performed on several samples of a stalagmitic floor from the Mousterian site of the Caverna delle Fate (Liguria, Italy), also dated by U-series between 90 and130 ka. The results confirm that DE values can be obtained from h3 and BL signals without annealing, while the h1 signal requires a thermal pre-treatment, to obtain the maximum intensity of this line. Then, on our samples, the DEvalues derived for the three lines are equivalent. It gives, hence, the opportunity to obtain data when the g=2.0007 line cannot be used. |