Influence of Magnetofossils on Paleointensity Estimations Inferred From Principal Component Analyses of First-Order Reversal Curve Diagrams for Sediments From the Western Equatorial Pacific

Relative abundance of magnetite originated from magnetotactic bacteria (magnetofossils) in sediments may influence relative paleointensity (RPI) estimations of the geomagnetic field, as some studies reported an inverse correlation between RPI and the ratio of anhysteretic remanent magnetization susceptibility to saturation isothermal remanent magnetization (k(ARM)/SIRM), a proxy of the proportion of biogenic to terrigenous magnetic minerals as well as magnetic grain size. This study aims to evaluate the influence of magnetofossils on RPI estimations more selectively using first-order reversal curve (FORC) diagrams. We studied three cores (KR0515-PC4, MD982187, and MR1402-PC1) from the western equatorial Pacific, among which large differences exist in the average natural remanent magnetization intensity normalized by ARM and k(ARM)/SIRM. Principal component analyses (PCAs) were applied to FORC diagrams measured on bulk specimens from the three cores and silicate-hosted magnetic inclusions extracted from Core MD982187, and three endmembers (EMs) were revealed (EM1: silicate-hosted magnetic inclusions, EM2: other terrigenous, EM3: biogenic). EM3 proportions vary widely among the three cores. The average RPI decreases with increasing EM3 proportion, which is probably caused by higher ARM acquisition efficiency of magnetofossils due to small magnetostatic interactions. EM3 proportion correlates with k(ARM)/SIRM, which confirms that k(ARM)/SIRM represents the proportion of biogenic to terrigenous magnetic components. Core MR1402-PC1 has the highest EM3 proportion, and its within-core variation is small. From FORC-PCA applied solely to this core, we infer that the configurations of biogenic magnetite chains such as bending and collapse may also influence k(ARM)/SIRM and RPI estimations.