The Varve Interpolation Program 3.0.0 - A unique and easy to use tool for incompletely varved sediments

Annually laminated (varved) sediments are particularly interesting for palaeo-environmental reconstruction, since they allow independent, high resolution chronological control. But often varved archives contain intervals in which seasonal layers did not form every year. To construct independent varve chronologies from such archives varve interpolation is required. Here, a significantly advanced Varve Interpolation Program (VIP) is presented, which uses a novel approach to interpolate varves. Through probability distribution fitting the varve thickness frequency distribution of an interval is approximated and used for interpolation. The new approach is superior in many respects to the approach used in the original VIP 1.0.0, but retains all the advantages, such as objectivity, reproducibility and the fact that it does not rely on well varved intervals. The program is designed for common log-normally distributed varve thickness frequency distributions. It is realised in Matlab, but comes with a graphical user interface, which allows easy handling and requires no prior knowledge about Matlab. The program can be run fully automated, but also allows manual control of settings. While the accuracy of the results depends on the characteristics of the data and the degree of varve formation/preservation, the application examples presented here show that under suitable conditions accuracies in the range of 2% can be achieved.