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      Temporal variability in shell mound formation at Albatross Bay, northern Australia

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          Abstract

          We report the results of 212 radiocarbon determinations from the archaeological excavation of 70 shell mound deposits in the Wathayn region of Albatross Bay, Australia. This is an intensive study of a closely co-located group of mounds within a geographically restricted area in a wider region where many more shell mounds have been reported. Valves from the bivalve Tegillarca granosa (Linnaeus, 1758) were dated. The dates obtained are used to calculate rates of accumulation for the shell mound deposits. These demonstrate highly variable rates of accumulation both within and between mounds. We assess these results in relation to likely mechanisms of shell deposition and show that rates of deposition are affected by time-dependent processes both during the accumulation of shell deposits and during their subsequent deformation. This complicates the interpretation of the rates at which shell mound deposits appear to have accumulated. At Wathayn, there is little temporal or spatial consistency in the rates at which mounds accumulated. Comparisons between the Wathayn results and those obtained from shell deposits elsewhere, both in the wider Albatross Bay region and worldwide, suggest the need for caution when deriving behavioural inferences from shell mound deposition rates, and the need for more comprehensive sampling of individual mounds and groups of mounds.

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          IntCal09 and Marine09 Radiocarbon Age Calibration Curves, 0–50,000 Years cal BP

          The IntCal04 and Marine04 radiocarbon calibration curves have been updated from 12 cal kBP (cal kBP is here defined as thousands of calibrated years before AD 1950), and extended to 50 cal kBP, utilizing newly available data sets that meet the IntCal Working Group criteria for pristine corals and other carbonates and for quantification of uncertainty in both the14C and calendar timescales as established in 2002. No change was made to the curves from 0–12 cal kBP. The curves were constructed using a Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) implementation of the random walk model used for IntCal04 and Marine04. The new curves were ratified at the 20th International Radiocarbon Conference in June 2009 and are available in the Supplemental Material atwww.radiocarbon.org.
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            Deposition models for chronological records

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              Radiocarbon Age Calibration of Marine Samples Back to 9000 Cal Yr BP

              Calibration curves spanning several millennia are now available in this special issue ofRadiocarbon. These curves, nearly all derived from the14C age determinations of wood samples, are to be used for the age conversion of samples that were formed through use of atmospheric CO2. When samples are formed in reservoirs (eg, lakes and oceans) that differ in specific14C content from the atmosphere, an age adjustment is needed because a conventional14C age, although taking into account14C (and13C) fractionation, does not correct for the difference in specific14C activity (Stuiver & Polach, 1977). The14C ages of samples grown in these environments are too old, and a reservoir age correction has to be applied. This phenomenon has been referred to as the reservoir effect (Stuiver & Polach, 1977).
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                Author and article information

                Contributors
                Role: ConceptualizationRole: Formal analysisRole: Funding acquisitionRole: InvestigationRole: MethodologyRole: Writing – original draftRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: ConceptualizationRole: Formal analysisRole: Funding acquisitionRole: InvestigationRole: MethodologyRole: Project administrationRole: ResourcesRole: Writing – original draftRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: Formal analysisRole: InvestigationRole: MethodologyRole: Writing – original draftRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: ConceptualizationRole: InvestigationRole: MethodologyRole: Writing – original draftRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: ConceptualizationRole: Funding acquisitionRole: InvestigationRole: MethodologyRole: Project administrationRole: ResourcesRole: Writing – original draftRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: ConceptualizationRole: InvestigationRole: Writing – original draftRole: Writing – review & editing
                Role: Editor
                Journal
                PLoS One
                PLoS ONE
                plos
                plosone
                PLoS ONE
                Public Library of Science (San Francisco, CA USA )
                1932-6203
                30 August 2017
                2017
                : 12
                : 8
                : e0183863
                Affiliations
                [1 ] Anthropology, School of Social Sciences, the University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
                [2 ] Department of Environmental Sciences, Macquarie University, New South Wales, Australia
                [3 ] Department of Archaeology, University of York, King's Manor, York, United Kingdom
                [4 ] Waikato Radiocarbon Laboratory, Hamilton, New Zealand
                [5 ] Archaeology, Flinders University, South Australia, Australia
                New York State Museum, UNITED STATES
                Author notes

                Competing Interests: Author JS was within the last five years an employee of one of the funding partners RioTintoAlcan (Weipa) Pty Ltd and author PF is currently an employee of Macquarie University. SJH has an honorary staff appointment to Macquarie University. This does not alter our adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.

                ‡ These authors also contributed equally to this work.

                Author information
                http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9948-3182
                Article
                PONE-D-17-10497
                10.1371/journal.pone.0183863
                5576746
                28854234
                1596925c-ec91-4b21-852f-d60a25530e16
                © 2017 Holdaway et al

                This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

                History
                : 16 March 2017
                : 11 August 2017
                Page count
                Figures: 4, Tables: 3, Pages: 24
                Funding
                Funded by: funder-id http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000923, Australian Research Council;
                Award ID: LP110100180
                Award Recipient :
                Funding to PCF SJH FP JIS GB was provided by an Australian Research Council Linkage Projects grant (LP110100180), with RioTintoAlcan (Weipa) Pty Ltd as the industry partner. Funding was also provided to PCF via a Linkage Projects Seeding Grant from Macquarie University and Rio Tinto Alcan Pty Ltd. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
                Categories
                Research Article
                Social Sciences
                Archaeology
                Archaeological Dating
                Radioactive Carbon Dating
                Research and Analysis Methods
                Chemical Characterization
                Isotope Analysis
                Radioactive Carbon Dating
                Social Sciences
                Archaeology
                Archaeological Dating
                Earth Sciences
                Geology
                Stratigraphy
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Agriculture
                Animal Products
                Meat
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Nutrition
                Diet
                Food
                Meat
                Medicine and Health Sciences
                Nutrition
                Diet
                Food
                Meat
                People and Places
                Geographical Locations
                Oceania
                Australia
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Organisms
                Animals
                Invertebrates
                Molluscs
                Bivalves
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Organisms
                Animals
                Invertebrates
                Molluscs
                Social Sciences
                Archaeology
                Custom metadata
                All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files.

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                Uncategorized

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