South Florida Holocene Coral Sea-level Database

Holocene-aged coral samples from the south Florida region were extensively characterized to create a new database of verified sea-level data (Stathakopoulos and others, in review). The samples were originally collected using coral-reef coring or other geologic sampling methods and were obtained by several different researchers from studies spanning the interval of 1977 to 2017. Many of these samples are presently stored in the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Core Archive at the St. Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center in St. Petersburg, Florida (https://doi.org/10.5066/F7319TR3). USGS staff compiled all relevant information from the publications pertaining to each sample and then, if the samples were available in the USGS Core Archive, researchers performed visual analyses to characterize the taphonomic condition and to determine if samples were in situ (growth position). Samples were then assigned a rank (from 0-3, with 0 being the highest rank) to indicate their quality and reliability for use as sea-level indicators based on a combination of the information from the publications and analyses results. This research is a part of the USGS Coral Reef Ecosystem Studies Project (https://www.usgs.gov/centers/spcmsc/science/coral-reef-ecosystem-studies-crest). Stathakopoulos, A., Riegl, B.M., Toth, L.T., 2020, A revised Holocene coral sea-level database from the Florida reef tract, USA: PeerJ 8:e8350, https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.8350.