Surface exposure dating of glacial deposits from the last glacial cycle

A major research goal in Quarternary sciences today is the reconstruction of past glacial fluctuations. Glacial deposits constitute an important terrestrial record of climate change. Linking the past athmospheric circulation pattern to terrestrial climate proxies is essential for an understanding of climate-glacier interaction. Surface exposure dating with cosmogenic nuclides produced in rock surfaces is an innovative technique for numerical dating of glacial landforms. Surface exposure dating has provided to be an invaluable tool for numerical dating of moraines. However, the surface exposure ages of moraine boulders cannot always be equated to the age of the landform. A detailed review of processes that affect moraine boulders in different glacial environments shows that precise exposure ages are more probably derived from small valley glaciers, whereas exposure ages from moraine boulders deposited in glacial environments where dead ice prevailed after deglaciation show a wide scatter in ages. Different interpretation models for surface exposure ages from moraines are summarized.