Abstract: Optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating is becoming an important Quaternary dating method, especially for sediments that cannot be dated by other methods, such as 14C and uranium-series. OSL dating can usually be reliably applied to sediments of ages ranging from decades to more than 100 kyr.The rapid development of OSL dating techniques over recent years is embodied by the establishment of single-aliquot protocols——— in particular, the single-aliquot regenerative-dose (SAR) protocol. These new techniques require much less sample for analysis than multiple-aliquot protocols and often result in an improvement in precision of equivalent dose estimates. In addition, single-aliquot methods make it possible to date sediments composed of grains that have been bleached by sunlight to different extents at the time of deposition. Various luminescence dating techniques have been applied to Paleolithic sites in Australia in order to provide age controls beyond the practical dating range of 14C. Results show that both thermoluminescence (TL) and OSL dating are feasible methods for sediments that have been sufficiently bleached at the time of deposition, while only single-aliquot protocols can be used to retrieve reliable age data from unequally and incompletely bleached samples. Because of the paucity of well bleached sediments at Paleolithic sites in China, single-aliquot protocols are believed to be the best choice to establish a luminescence-based temporal framework.

Key words: Optical dating; Single-aliquot protocol; Paleolithic sites