TIMES is the acronym of a large-scale international science initiative “Time Integrated Matrix for Earth Sciences” (Link: https://www.codd-home.net/times/). The idea is to launch a global program with the aim of synchronizing age models for particularly important geological climate records from the past 100 million years. The motivation for this program is given in a white paper published in the journal Paleoceanography and Paleoclimatology of the American Geophysical Union (Link: https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2024PA004932).
Figure 1: Schematic overview of the TIMES project, where disciplines in geochronology interact with proxy data and modeling efforts.
Geological records of the past allow researchers to better understand how the natural climate system works over time and space, but to obtain reliable information, precise knowledge of the timing of past climate events is required. At present, many important climate archives are not sufficiently well synchronized to establish causal links between data from different locations with certainty.
TIMES founder Thomas Westerhold notes, “In particular, age models for paleoclimate archives have proven to be a bottleneck when it comes to understanding the dynamics of past warm climate states, which is so urgently needed to obtain information about future climate pathways.”
Bringing together a multidisciplinary team of palaeoceanographers, palaeoclimatologists and geochronologists, the initiative emphasizes that it is crucial to synchronize globally consistent and very accurate dating for all important sedimentary climate archives across geographical regions. One synchronization possibility may be the recurring patterns in sediment cores that trace changes in the Earth’s orbit around the sun, known as Milanković cycles. Like a metronome, these fluctuations have set the pace for climate change. Using these recorded astronomical cycles, researchers can determine the age in certain layers of the ocean floor and thus synchronize the archives with unprecedented accuracy.
Thomas Westerhold explains the need for this initiative as “It is important to now understand the biological and climatic processes on Earth that influence evolution, extinction, recovery and resilience. However, the most important climate proxy data from the past 100 million years, which can provide precise information about this, are not sufficiently synchronized in time across different regions, which makes it considerably more difficult to understand the Earth’s climate dynamics”. Some of the material and data for this period is available through the international ocean and continental drilling programs.
Synchronizing 100 million years of regional and global climate history is very complex, and the TIMES project is very ambitious. To kick off this large science-driven effort, more than 70 experts in Earth’s geologic history, including geochronologists, astrochronologists, and paleoclimatologists, gathered in person and online at Carnegie Science’s Earth & Planets Laboratory from August 12-15, 2025 for a workshop, organized by Carnegie Staff Scientist Jennifer Kasbohm (Link: https://carnegiescience.edu/news/time-integrated-matrix-earth-sciences-times-kicks-workshop-carnegies-epl). Speakers at the meeting traveled from universities and research institutions as far as New Zealand, Malaysia, Pakistan, Colombia, and Japan, and virtual participation ensured attendees from still farther countries were able to participate. The gathering was made possible with support by the Heising-Simons Foundation, the Cushman Foundation for Foraminiferal Research, the International Ocean Discovery Program’s U.S. Science Support Program, and Carnegie Science. It provided an excellent foundation and network possibility for participants. Aims for working groups were started in breakout discussions. We highlight that TIMES is an initiative open to the whole scientific community, and open to further participants – feel free to reach out to working group(s) of your interest (Link: https://www.codd-home.net/times/working-groups/).
Figure 2: Participants of the TIMES Kick-off meeting in Washington. Image Courtesy of Carnegie Science.
