Jun’ichi Okuno
Principal Investigator
National Institute of Polar Research / Research Organization of Information and Systems
Project Overview
During the Late Quaternary, sea levels fluctuated significantly, by over 130 m, driven by substantial mass exchange between continental ice sheets and oceans. This redistribution of surface loads induced viscoelastic deformation within the Earth’s interior. The Japanese Islands display prominent hydro-isostatic responses, characterized by crustal adjustments due to changes in water mass loading. This study conducts high-resolution numerical modeling of hydro-isostasy to reconstruct theoretical sea-level variations and the resulting paleogeographic configurations across the Japanese Islands throughout the Late Quaternary. The resulting spatio-temporal datasets are expected to provide critical insights for multidisciplinary interpretation, particularly within archaeological contexts, thereby contributing to the advancement of the emerging discipline of “Integrative Bioarchaeology”.
