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Cosmogenic production rates (PRs) are the essential conversion factor between AMS cosmogenic concentrations and absolute exposure ages. The accuracy of cosmogenic glacial chronologies and reliability in their comparison to other paleoclimate systems is largely contingent on the precision and accuracy of the adopted production rate. This is particularly critical in determining past glacial geochronologies at the scale of millennial temporal resolution. Most PR calibrations are carried out at deglaciation sites where radiocarbon provides the independent chronometric control usually based on 14C ages in basal sediments or varves from lake or bog cores which is assumed to represent the minimum age for glacial retreat. Under these conditions and hence provide PRs as maximum values. Given that today most AMS facilities can deliver 10-Be, 26-Al and 36-Cl data with total analytical errors less than 2% ( for 10 ka exposure), the precision of a PR remains largely dependent on the error in the independent chronology and accuracy of AMS standards. The history over the past 20 years of the ever-decreasing value of SLHL 10-Be cosmogenic spallation PRs from initial estimates of about 7 atoms/g/a to the current ‘accepted‘ (global average) values of ~4 atoms/g/a, is an interesting story in itself and demonstrates the complexity in such determinations. Over the past few years new web-based calculators are now available to calculate uniformly new production rates from either new data or combinations of any set of published data (CRONUS-Earth, CRONUS-UW, CosmoCalc, ICE-D, CREp). This delivers a means by which new production rates can be seamlessly integrated and compared using identical constants, methods and statistics that were used to generate (currently accepted) global average or regional production rates. For the British Isles, there are a number of 10-Be reference sites that give PRs (Lm scheme) between 3.89±3% atoms/g/a (Putnam, QG, v50, 2019) to 4.20±1% atoms/g/a (Small, JQS, v30, 2015) which convert to 3.95 and 4.28, respectively, using datasets in the ICE-D calculator). This difference in 10-Be spallation PRs has recently raised some debate and challenges for the timing of the local-LGM and demise of the British Ice Sheet. This work provides a new British Isles site specific 10Be PR from the Arenig Mountains in North Wales where radiocarbon dating of basal sediments from a bog core associated with a series of nearby cirque moraines provides independent age control. Similarly in the South Island of New Zealand, the current accepted 10Be PR is 3.76±2% (Putnam, QG 2009; converts to 3.94±1% using ICE-D) and is the only available PR that is used for these southern hemispheric glacial sites. This work provides a new Australasian site specific 10Be PR from Arthurs Pass retreat moraines where radiocarbon dating of basal sediments from three cores extracted from a bog impounded by the moraine provides independent age control.

We present two carbonate oxygen and carbon isotope records from late Miocene – early Pleistocene stratigraphic sections from the southern flank of the Issyk Kul basin, Kyrgyz Tien Shan. The two sections are 700 and 500 m thick and composed of fluvial and lacustrine sediments. They were dated using magnetostratigraphy (Roud et al., G-Cubed, in review) and 26Al/10Be isochron burial dating (presented here).Carbonate stable isotope data is useful for reconstruction of climate in Asia over the Cenozoic. Oxygen isotopes are commonly used to detect moisture sources and their interaction with topography. Pedogenic carbon isotopes are used to reconstruct past atmospheric CO2 levels or the spread of C4 vegetation.The environment of Central Asia is primarily affected by the northern mid-latitude westerlies − winds transporting moisture eastward across Eurasia. Issyk Kul basin is situated on the windward side of the northern Tien Shan. Published data suggest that the Tien Shan mountain ranges interacted with the westerlies since late Oligocene and reorganized Central Asian climate during Neogene (Caves et al., 2017; Charreau et al., 2012; Macaulay et al., 2016; Wang, et al., 2020). The amount of existing published paleoclimate data from northern Central Asia is scarce compared to interior China, and therefore the influence of the Tien Shan uplift on climate in Asia during the Cenozoic is poorly reconstructed.Our data provide new insight into the role of the range and its interaction with the westerlies in forming climate on the windward side of the northern Tien Shan in the late Neogene. We combine our data with published stratigraphically-older sections nearby (Macaulay et al., 2016) to complete the Neogene stable isotope record of the Issyk Kul basin and study how the evolution of the basin influenced regional climate.Our d18O and d13C values show slightly positive trends, unlike stratigraphically-older data from the Issyk Kul basin. The preliminary interpretation suggests that the circulation pattern within the range was changed in late Miocene possibly reflecting active tectonic uplift northward of the basin and an increase in aridification.

Cosmogenic 10Be and 26Al exposure ages from 20 erratic samples collected from Cadair Idris (893 m), a mountain in southern Snowdonia, Wales, provide evidence for the timing of deglaciation from summits to cirques at the end of the Late Pleistocene. The summit of the mountain is characterised by intensely modified frost-shattered surfaces that have long been identified as a representing a former nunatak. Numerous glacially-transported quartz boulders on the highest ground indicate that ice overran the summit at some point in the Pleistocene. Two quartz boulders, one with preserved striations, sampled at c. 856 m near the summit of Cadair Idris yielded consistent 10Be and 26Al paired exposure ages of 75 ka to 60 ka (using a high-latitude sea level 10Be spallation production rate of 4.20 at/g/y, scaled by the Lal/Stone scheme). A glacially polished bedrock quartzite outcrop at 735 m gave an age of 17.5 ka. Immediately below this, cirque and down-valley recessional moraine ages, covering an elevation of 480 m to 350 m ranged from 10 to 15 ka respectively.These results confirm that Cadair Idris was overridden by the Welsh Ice Cap during marine isotope stage (MIS) 4, when ice was thicker than at the global last glacial maximum (LGM) in MIS 2. This is consistent with findings from northern Snowdonia. The highest Welsh summits, including Cadair Idris, emerged above a thinning Welsh Ice Cap (British Irish Ice Sheet) during the transition from MIS 4 to 3. The summit area above ~800 m then stood as nunataks above the LGM ice sheet surface in MIS 2. The Welsh Ice Cap then rapidly thinned over Cadair Idris at ~20-17 ka based on ages from high-level ice-moulded bedrockThis is supported by more new ages from high-level paired erratics and bedrock samples on several other mountains throughout Snowdonia, leading to a phase of alpine-style deglaciation. Valley glaciers initiated their retreat up-valley from ~17 to 14 ka after Heinrich Event 1. A later phase of glacier stabilisation or still stand formation produced classic cirque moraines near the rim of a present cirque lake basin (480 m elevation) yielding 10Be ages of 13-10 ka during the Younger Dryas.

The eastern seaboard of Australia is characterized by a passive margin and a continental divide that separates the inland-draining rivers from those that drain to the Coral and Tasman seas. Seaward of this divide lies the Great Escarpment (GE) of Australia that separates a moderate relief coastal plain from a low relief, high elevation plateau. Quantifying the spatial variation of erosion rates from temperate New England (NE), NSW and tropical Bellenden Ker (BK), Queensland, two regions with distinctly different climates and escarpment embayment, could help constrain erosional controls that contribute to escarpment form. In this study, we compared forty detrital 10Be samples collected from sediments in the main trunk and tributaries of five major rivers: the Macleay, Bellinger, and Clarence in NE and the Russel-Mulgrave and North Johnstone in BK. We then traced the escarpment position in ARCGIS and calculated a sinuosity ratio to better compare the degree of embayment in each region. Across both datasets we found that for NE, which has deep gorges cutting into the plateau, the degree of embayment was twice that of BK, where the escarpment position is significantly less embayed and erosion rates significantly more variable (ratio of .18 vs .38). Erosion rates in low slope areas, such as on the plateau, were universally low with no other significant controlling factors. There was no correlation between erosion rates and catchment area, and that our data echo previous studies that find that once mean rainfall passes an approximate threshold (around 2000mm/yr) basin characteristics that are known to control erosion rates, such as slope and lithology, are subdued. In temperate NE, where rainfall ranges from approximately 800-1200mm/yr, there was a moderate linear correlation with mean catchment rainfall and erosion rates (R2 .50), which is likely due to a strong orographic effect due to the escarpment. Erosion rates from tributaries below the plateau were highly variable and ranged from 5m/Ma up to 60m/Ma and correlated strongly with mean catchment slope (R2 .86). In addition, there were moderate inverse linear correlations between erosion rate and the catchment total percent granite and sedimentary rock (R2 .53 and .63 respectively) and a moderate correlation between erosion rate and catchment total percent metamorphic rock (R2 .57). Similar to previous studies, these data suggest that in temperate climates with moderate amounts of annual rainfall, individual basin characteristics play a significant role in controlling basin wide erosion rates.In contrast, data from tropical BK, where mean rainfall amounts are in excess of 2000mm/yr, erosion rates from tributaries below the plateau were significantly less variable than NE. Rates had a mean of 37m/Ma ± 9 (standard deviation 5m/Ma, N=10) and were not significantly correlated with mean catchment slope nor catchment lithology. The mean erosion rate of BK is similar to that of other studies in the region, though with slightly less variability, and possibly reinforces the hypothesis from other researchers that in tropical climates with significant mean rainfall, soil depth effectively armors hillslopes and prevents bedrock erosion from occurring.