Citation:

PANGAEA.995756

Name: Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectra of sedimentary charcoal fragments from Purghagoolah (Lake Elusive), southeastern Australia, for fire-temperature reconstruction
Published: 2026-07-17
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Keywords: analogue matching; Charcoal; fire temperature; FTIR; Infrared Spectroscopy; Lake Elusive; palaeofire; Purghagoolah; pyrolysis temperature; southeastern Australia

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Published: 2026-07-17 • DOI registered: 2026-07-17

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Abstract:

This table provides mid-infrared absorbance spectra of individual charcoal fragments isolated from a 1 m sediment core at Purghagoolah (Lake Elusive), a lake of approximately 40 ha and 21 m depth in Croajingolong National Park, Gippsland, southeastern Australia, on Gunaikurnai Country (37°44'50"S, 149°27'9"E; decimal -37.747222, 149.452500, WGS84; 50 m a.s.l.), cored on 9 February 2021 with a Universal Corer (Aquatic Instruments), used to reconstruct past fire (pyrolysis) temperature. Approximately 20 charcoal fragments per level were isolated from undigested sediment, and transmission FTIR spectra were acquired on a Nicolet iN10 MX infrared microscope using OMNIC Picta software over the mid-infrared range. Each row is one fragment, identified by its sample age (a BP), with absorbance reported at each wavenumber from 951 to 3499 cm-1. The spectra were compared against a modern reference spectral library (provided separately in this submission) by analogue matching to estimate maximum pyrolysis temperature. A total of 1,092 fragment spectra are included.

Keyword(s):

analogue matching; Charcoal; fire temperature; FTIR; Infrared Spectroscopy; Lake Elusive; palaeofire; Purghagoolah; pyrolysis temperature; southeastern Australia

Related to:

Fletcher, Michael-Shawn; et al. (submitted): Australia's current wildfire crisis linked to colonial land-use change. Nature

Coverage:

Latitude: -37.747222 * Longitude: 149.452500

Date/Time Start: 2021-02-09T00:00:00 * Date/Time End: 2021-02-09T00:00:00

Minimum Elevation: 50.0 m * Maximum Elevation: 50.0 m

Event(s):

Purghagoolah * Latitude: -37.747222 * Longitude: 149.452500 * Date/Time: 2021-02-09T00:00:00 * Elevation: 50.0 m * Location: Lake Elusive, Victoria, Australia * Method/Device: Universal Corer, Aquatic Instruments (UC)

Parameter(s):

#	Name	Short Name	Unit	Principal Investigator
1	Text file	TEXT		Fletcher, Michael-Shawn
2	Text file (File Size)	TEXT (Size)	Bytes	Fletcher, Michael-Shawn
3	Text file (Media Type)	TEXT (Type)		Fletcher, Michael-Shawn
4	File content	Content		Fletcher, Michael-Shawn

License:

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC-BY-4.0)

Status:

Curation Level: Basic curation (CurationLevelB)

Size:

2 data points

Data

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1 TEXT	2 TEXT (Size) [Bytes]	3 TEXT (Type)	4 Content
Purghagoolah_FTIR_sample_spectra.txt	34.7 MBytes	text/plain	Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectra of sedimentary charcoal fragments