Isabella Raffi

Isabella Raffi
University of Chieti-Pescara | UNICH · Department of Engineering and Geology (InGeo)

Professor

About

501
Publications
90,297
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Introduction
Isabella Raffi currently works at the Department of Engineering and Geology (InGeo), Università degli Studi G. d'Annunzio Chieti - Pescara. Isabella does research in Paleontology of calcareous nannofossils and Paleoclimatology. Their most recent publication is 'Orbitally forced hyperstratification of the Oligocene South Atlantic Ocean'.
Additional affiliations
April 1994 - July 2013
University of Chieti-Pescara

Publications

Publications (501)
Article
Full-text available
A high-resolution record of central Mediterranean Sea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) based on the alkenone UK’37 index and planktic δ¹⁸O values for the surface-dweller G. ruber has been reconstructed across the Pliocene/Pleistocene transition at Monte San Nicola (Sicily), reference area for the GSSP (Global Boundary Stratotype Section and Point) of th...
Article
Il Museo Universitario di Chieti ha partecipato all’edizione 2021 della Settimana del Pianeta Terra, con l’inaugurazione della mostra “La montagna della Maiella 16 milioni di anni fa: delfini, foche, squali e coccodrilli”. Questa mostra è stata ideata e organizzata per volere congiunto dell’Università degli Studi “G. d’Annunzio”, della Soprintenden...
Article
Full-text available
Studying monsoon dynamics during past warm time periods such as the Miocene Climatic Optimum (MCO; ∼16.9–14.5 Ma) could greatly aid in better projecting monsoon intensity, in the context of future greenhouse warming. However, studies on regional MCO temperature change and its effect on the monsoons during this time period are lacking. Here, we pres...
Article
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The late Paleocene to early Eocene interval is characterized by a series of carbon perturbations that caused transient warming (hyperthermal) events, of which the Paleocene‐Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) was the largest. These hyperthermals can be recognized in the pelagic sedimentary record as paired negative δ¹³C and δ¹⁸O excursions, in addition t...
Article
The present study focuses on calcareous nannofossil biostratigraphy of the last 23 Myr in the Mediterranean region and is intended as a review paper in which an updated zonation is presented. This includes the improvements in biostratigraphic classification achieved in the last decades. The proposed biozonal scheme incorporates the biochronologic d...
Preprint
Full-text available
Studying West African Monsoon (WAM) dynamics during past warm time periods such as the Miocene Climatic Optimum (MCO; ~16.9 – 14.5 Ma) could greatly aid in better projecting monsoon intensity, in the context of future greenhouse warming. However, studies on regional MCO temperature change and its effect on the WAM system during this time period are...
Article
Full-text available
Reticulofenestra pseudoumbilicus is a Neogene calcareous nannofossil species whose highest stratigraphic occurrence (Top) is a reliable biohorizon in the Pliocene, calibrated at 3.82 Ma. The species is present in the stratigraphic record from at least the Middle Miocene, within an interval around the biohorizon Top Sphenolithus heteromorphus, calib...
Article
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This review paper has been thought to emphasize the role of Biostratigraphy in Geosciences and, specifically, of calcareous nannofossils as dating tool. This group of calcareous plankton occurs in Mesozoic and Cenozoic carbonate-bearing marine sediments in all depositional settings and is routinely used for stratigraphic purposes. The importance of...
Article
The Monte San Nicola area (Southern Sicily) offers a spectacular exposure of open-marine sediments that were employed in 1998 for defining the Global Stratotype Section and Point (GSSP) of the Gelasian Stage (Upper Pliocene). After the lowering of the Pliocene/Pleistocene boundary to ca. 2.6 Ma in 2010, the Gelasian GSSP has been redefined as the b...
Article
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The base of the Priabonian Stage is one of two stage boundaries in the Paleogene that remains to be formalized. The Alano section (NE Italy) was elected by consensus as a suitable candidate for the base of the Priabonian during the Priabonian Working Group meeting held in Alano di Piave in June 2012. Further detailed research on the section is now...
Chapter
The Neogene oceans and continents were mosaicked to form a paleogeography similar to today and exposed to the warm conditions of the mid Neogene to the cooling toward the glacial Quaternary. Antarctic ice sheets stabilized, then Northern Hemisphere ice sheets grew and thickened. Tectonics continued to shape the continents and ocean floor. High risi...
Article
The existing chronostratigraphic framework in NW Cyprus of two-phase, Early and Late Miocene reef and associated facies development is tested and improved using a combination of calcareous nannofossil, benthic and planktic foraminiferal, and also Sr isotope dating. Following localised Late Oligocene neritic carbonate deposition (e.g. benthic forami...
Article
The Dardanelles region has formed a key gateway connecting the Eastern Paratethys and the Aegean/Mediterranean since the late Miocene. Its sedimentary sequences contain crucial information about connectivity and tectonics but so far lack unambiguous age constraints. Only a few Miocene marine episodes have been documented and fossil assemblages are...
Article
Full-text available
International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) Expedition 378 was designed to recover the first comprehensive set of Paleogene sedimentary sections from a transect of sites strategically positioned in the South Pacific to reconstruct key changes in oceanic and atmospheric circulation. These sites would have provided an unparalleled opportunity to add...
Chapter
The Neogene oceans and continents were mosaicked to form a paleogeography similar to today and exposed to the warm conditions of the mid Neogene to the cooling toward the glacial Quaternary. Antarctic ice sheets stabilized, then Northern Hemisphere ice sheets grew and thickened. Tectonics continued to shape the continents and ocean floor. High risi...
Article
Unusual bedded manganese deposits occur within hemipelagic carbonates, dated as early Messinian (<6.82 Ma but >5.97 Ma) based on calcareous nannofossils. These sediments accumulated during a time of increased isolation of the Mediterranean Sea from the Atlantic Ocean but prior to major sea-level fall and evaporite precipitation during the Messinian...
Article
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The recently uplifted and exposed Pliocene and Pleistocene sedimentary infill of the neotectonic Polis graben provides an excellent opportunity to understand extensional basin development in a marine setting. Fieldwork, facies analysis and dating using nannofossils and strontium isotopes reveal how the sedimentary conditions evolved during infill o...
Article
The Eocene-Oligocene transition marks a fundamental step in the evolution of the modern climate. This climate change and the consequent major oceanic reorganisation affected the global carbon cycle, whose dynamics across this crucial interval are far from being clearly understood. In this work, the upper Eocene to lower Oligocene δ13CCarb and δ13CT...
Article
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Pelagic sediments from the subtropical South Atlantic Ocean contain geographically extensive Oligocene ooze and chalk layers that consist almost entirely of the calcareous nannofossil Braarudosphaera. Poor recovery and the lack of precise dating of these horizons in previous studies has limited the understanding of the number of acmes, their timing...
Article
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Detailed distribution ranges of the genus Ericsonia were obtained in the upper Paleocene interval from two deep-sea sections, ODP Site 1262 (South Eastern Atlantic Ocean) and Site 1215 (Eastern Equatorial Pacific Ocean), and were complemented with morphometric analyses with the purpose of clarifying the taxonomy of the Paleocene species ascribed to...
Article
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To fully understand the global climate dynamics of the warm early Eocene with its reoccurring hyperthermal events, an accurate high-fidelity age model is required. The Ypresian stage (56–47.8 Ma) covers a key interval within the Eocene as it ranges from the warmest marine temperatures in the early Eocene to the long-term cooling trends in the middl...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
A continuous record across the "Braarudosphaera chalks" was recovered from mid-Oligocene (~30-27Ma) deep-sea sediments in the subtropical South Atlantic Ocean and has been studied in detail. This stratigraphic section from ODP Site 1264 (Walvis Ridge) documents a succession of several chalky layers that consist almost completely of Braarudosphaera...
Article
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Calcareous nannofossils are considered one of the most powerful biostratigraphical tool in marine carbonate sediments especially in open ocean settings. Their origination goes at least as far back as the Triassic (ca. 220 Ma) when they first biomineralized and produced calcite skeletons. Since then, they have evolved rapidly showing widespread biog...
Article
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In June 2016 the Paleogene, Neogene, and Quaternary subcommissions (ISPS, SNS, SQS) of the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS) voted on whether to formalize sub-series and their geochronologic equivalents, sub-epochs. The vote required a 60 percent majority for the proposal to be forwarded to the ICS for further consideration. That major...
Article
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Significance The Antarctic ice cap waxed and waned on astronomical time scales throughout the Oligo-Miocene time interval. We quantify geometries of Antarctic ice age cycles, as expressed in a new climate record from the South Atlantic Ocean, to track changing dynamics of the unipolar icehouse climate state. We document numerous ∼110-thousand-year-...
Article
Full-text available
To fully understand the global climate dynamics of the warm early Eocene with its reoccurring hyperthermal events, an accurate high-fidelity age model is required. The Ypresian Stage (56–47.8 Ma) covers a key interval within the Eocene as it ranges from the warmest marine temperatures in the early Eocene to the long-term cooling trends in the middl...
Article
Assemblages of upper lower through upper Miocene Discoaster spp. have been quantified from Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) Site U1338 in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean. These assemblages can be grouped into five broad morphological categories: six-rayed with bifurcated ray tips, six-rayed with large central areas, six-rayed with poin...
Article
The middle Miocene is an important time to understand modern global climate evolution and its consequences on marine systems. The Mid-Miocene Climatic Optimum (between 17.0 Ma and13.5 Ma), was the warmest time interval of the past 35 million years during which atmospheric CO2 concentrations were lower than today. In the Mid-Miocene Climatic Optimum...
Article
Full-text available
The need for an update of the calcareous nannofossil biozonations proposed by Martini (1971) and Bukry (1973,1975), more than 40 years ago, prompted us to develop two new biozonations published in 2012 and 2014, one for the Miocene through Pleistocene interval and one for the Paleogene interval (Backman et al., 2012; Agnini et al., 2014). These bio...
Article
In this study, calcareous nannofossils have been used for refining the biostratigraphic classification and chronology of a neritic Paleogene sedimentary succession, outcropping in the Central Apennines (Italy) and belonging to the ,,Santo Spirito Formation". Calcareous nannofossils are typically found in deep-sea sediments, but proved to be consist...
Article
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Few astronomically calibrated high-resolution (≤5 kyr) climate records exist that span the Oligocene–Miocene time interval. Notably, available proxy records show responses varying in amplitude at frequencies related to astronomical forcing, and the main pacemakers of global change on astronomical time-scales remain debated. Here we present newly ge...
Article
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Constructing geological time series from integrated stratigraphy and multiple data sets presented by different research groups may, naturally, cause conflicting results and interpretations. Clearly, choices must be made, based on published or newly acquired, but verifiable, results. In this context, we consider reproducibility of results to be a ke...
Article
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The stratigraphic architecture of the Bolognano Formation documents the evolution of the Majella carbonate platform in response to global and local changes that affected the Mediterranean area during the Oligocene–Miocene interval. The Bolognano Formation consists of a homoclinal rampthat developed in a warm, subtropical environment. Five different...
Article
The collision of India with Asia had a profound influence on Cenozoic topography, oceanography, climate, and faunal turnover. However, estimates of the time of the initial collision, when Indian continental crust arrived at the Transhimalayan trench, remain highly controversial. Here we use radiolarian and nannofossil biostratigraphy coupled with d...
Article
Past hydrological interactions between the Mediterranean Sea and Black Sea are poorly resolved due to complications in establishing a high-resolution time frame for the Black Sea. We present a new greigite-based magnetostratigraphic age model for the Mio-Pliocene deposits of DSDP Hole 380/380A, drilled in the southwestern Black Sea. This age model...
Conference Paper
The Oligo-Miocene shallow-water succession outcropping in the Majella Mountain represents a case study for analyzing the sedimentary product from different global e regional events that characterized this time interval, providing that a well-constrained stratigraphic frame is available. With this intent we analyzed a succession belonging to the Bol...
Conference Paper
The Eocene-Oligocene boundary is a key interval for understanding modern climate, since it marks the onset of the Antartica Ice Cap (Lear et al., 2008) and the transition from a greenhouse period to the modern icehouse one. While the response of deep-sea systems has been widely studied, even within the Mediterranean area (Bodiselitsch et al., 2004)...
Conference Paper
This work focuses on the Bartonian to lower Rupelian interval of the Santo Spirito Formation (Danian-Rupelian) outcropping in the northern sector of the Majella Mountain (Central Apennines). In this sector the investigated deposits represent the sedimentation in middle to outer ramp environments. The outer ramp consists of marly, highly bioturbated...
Chapter
Full-text available
Calcareous nannofossils have provided a powerful biostratigraphic tool since the 1950's and 1960's, when several milestone papers began to highlight their potential use in dating Cenozoic sediments and rocks. Here, we present a new calcareous nannofossil biozonation for the Paleogene Period, which is based on biostratigraphic data collected during...
Chapter
Full-text available
The deep-water hemipelagic Alano section is located in the Southern Alps of northern–eastern Italy close to the village of Alano di Piave in the type area of the Priabonian. Since 2005, the section has been presented as the potential Global Boundary Stratotype Section and Point (GSSP) for the late Eocene Priabonian Stage at several meetings of the...
Article
Integrated Ocean Drilling Program Expeditions 320 & 321, "Pacific Equatorial Age Transect" (PEAT) (Sites U1331-U1338), recovered a continuous Cenozoic record of the equatorial Pacific by coring above the paleoposition of the Equator at successive crustal ages on the Pacific plate. These sediments record the evolution of the equatorial climate syste...
Data
Full-text available
Jack day Una giornata dedicata a Giovanni Pallini Cari amici e colleghi, venerdì 4 ottobre 2013 si terrà una giornata dedicata alla memoria del Prof. Giovanni Pallini a 10 anni dalla scomparsa, presso l'Aula Magna (ex-rettorato) dell'Università "G. d'Annunzio" di Chieti-Pescara, via dei Vestini 31, Chieti. La giornata si pone come obiettivo princip...
Article
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Examination of Upper Miocene-Lower Pliocene sediments at IODP Site U1338, in the Eastern Equatorial Pacific, provided new data on the distribution range of the calcareous nannofossil genus Catinaster. In addition to the the well-known occurrence of Catinaster coalitus and Catinaster calyculus in the early Late Miocene, we document Catinaster mexica...
Article
Census data of a major Cenozoic calcareous nannofossil genus (Discoaster) have been acquired from Site U1338, located near the Equator in the eastern Pacific Ocean and drilled in 2009 during Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) Expedition 321. The investigated 147.53 m thick upper Miocene sediment sequence is primarily composed of biogenic carb...
Article
Full-text available
The modern Equatorial Pacific setting is progressively developed during the Miocene and the Pliocene, with a gradual closure of the Central American Seaway (CAS) and the gradual constriction of the Indonesian seaway. In parallel, the Earth experienced a climatic transition from the mid-Miocene warm period to the modern "ice-house" climate with the...
Article
Full-text available
New age data from Sr isotope analysis and both planktonic foraminifera and nannofossils are presented and discussed here for the Upper Eocene–Upper Miocene sedimentary rocks of the Değirmenlik (Kythrea) Group. New dating is also given of some Cretaceous and Pliocene sediments. In a revised stratigraphy the Değirmenlik (Kythrea) Group is divided int...
Article
This study presents a new alkenone-derived Sea Surface Temperature (SST) record and δ18ONoelaerhabdaceae data of the 2–5 μm carbonate fractions from the IODP site U1338 located in the Eastern Equatorial Pacific (EEP), over the Miocene–Pliocene. Our data and those available from other sites of the same area show the establishment of a cold tongue du...
Data
This study presents a new alkenone-derived Sea Surface Temperature (SST) record and d18ONoelaerhabdaceae data of the 2-5 µm carbonate fractions from the IODP site U1338 located in the Eastern Equatorial Pacific (EEP), over the Miocene-Pliocene. Our data and those available from other sites of the same area show the establishment of a cold tongue du...