Search results for "Environmental change"
showing 10 items of 93 documents
Unionid shells (Hyriopsis cumingii) record manganese cycling at the sediment-water interface in a shallow eutrophic lake in China (Lake Taihu)
2017
Abstract Aquatic eutrophication is becoming a serious environmental problem throughout the world. The utility of bivalves as bio-filters to improve water quality and reduce algal blooms has been widely acknowledged, but the potential usefulness of bivalve shells as retrospective monitors of eutrophication-induced environmental change has received little attention. Here, we present the first multi-year, high-resolution Mn/Ca shell records of the freshwater mussel, Hyriopsis cumingii (Lea, 1852) from a shallow eutrophic lake (Lake Taihu, China). Mn/Ca shell time-series of the two studied shells exhibit a high degree of synchrony after being placed in a precise temporal context by means of gro…
Environmental change during the Early Cretaceous in the Purbeck-type Durlston Bay section (Dorset, Southern England): a biomarker approach.
2007
20 pages; International audience; The Purbeck-type section (Durlston Bay, Dorset, UK) exhibits littoral lagoonal to lacustrine facies. It shows a gradual climatic/environmental change from semi-arid conditions associated with evaporites at the Jurassic–Cretaceous transition, to a more humid climate at the end of the Berriasian. Though generally organic-poor (total organic carbon, TOC, <1.3%), the Durlston Bay section shows an organic-rich episode (TOC up to 8.5%) located at the transition from evaporitic to more humid facies. A biomarker study was performed in order to determine the origin of the organic matter (OM) in the section and see if changes in organic sources accompanied the genera…
The response of flood-plain ecosystems to the Late Glacial and Early Holocene hydrological changes: A case study from a small Central European river …
2016
Abstract We use a range of environmental variables to explore the possible drivers influencing the biota, especially the composition of aquatic invertebrates, during the Younger Dryas (YD) and Early Holocene (EH) in different river valley sites: a well-developed meandering river and the confluence zone of headwater streams. Using pollen, macrofossil, cladoceran, and chironomid as well as geochemical and lithological data as proxies for environmental factors (i.e., water depth and temperature), we attempt to show that these different sites display similar hydroclimatic signals (especially floods). The geochemical records in the studied valley are correlated with environmental factors, such a…
Human occupation and environmental change in the western Maghreb during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) and the Late Glacial. New evidence from the Ib…
2019
With the onset of the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), hunter-gatherers of the so-called Iberomaurusian techno-complex appeared in what is now the Mediterranean Maghreb. During a period of about seven thousand years, these groups left sandy occupation layers in a limited number of archaeological sites, while at the beginning of Greenland Interstadial (GI) 1, the sudden shift towards the deposition of shell-rich sediments and the increase in number of sites document clear changes in subsistence strategies as well as occupation density. It is highly likely that these shifts in human behaviour are related to paleoenvironmental changes in the area, which, so far, are poorly documented in geological …
New research on the development of high-resolution palaeoenvironmental proxies from geochemical properties of biogenic carbonates
2017
Abstract Geochemical signatures from biogenic carbonates are being increasingly employed as palaeoenvironmental proxies. In turn, many of these proxy archives including mollusc shells, corals, and otoliths have periodic growth structures, which allow the reconstruction of chronologically constrained records of palaeoenvironmental variability at unparalleled high temporal resolution. Studying the growth and chemistry of these periodic growth structures is known as sclerochronology. Biogenic hard parts accumulate in geological or archaeological deposits, and can be directly dated using radiometric and racemisation methods. They therefore offer the opportunity for high-resolution palaeoenviron…
Cultural evolution and environmental change in Central Europe between 40 and 15 ka
2020
The role of environmental change in the evolution of cultural traits is a topic of long-standing scientific debate with strongly contrasting views. Major obstacles for assessing environmental impacts on the evolution of material culture are the fragmentary nature of archaeological and – to a somewhat lesser extent – geoscientific archives and the insufficient chronological resolution of these archives and related proxy data. Together these aspects are causing difficulties in data synchronization. By no means does this paper attempt to solve these issues, but rather aims at shifting the focus from demonstrating strict chains of causes and events to describing roughly contemporaneous developm…
Environmental drivers interactively affect individual tree growth across temperate European forests
2019
Forecasting the growth of tree species to future environmental changes requires a better understanding of its determinants. Tree growth is known to respond to global-change drivers such as climate change or atmospheric deposition, as well as to local land-use drivers such as forest management. Yet, large geographical scale studies examining interactive growth responses to multiple global-change drivers are relatively scarce and rarely consider management effects. Here, we assessed the interactive effects of three global-change drivers (temperature, precipitation and nitrogen deposition) on individual tree growth of three study species (Quercus robur/petraea, Fagus sylvatica and Fraxinus exc…
Environmental determinants of chironomid communities in remote northern lakes across the treeline – Implications for climate change assessments
2016
Abstract Chironomids ( Diptera : Chironomidae ) in northern lakes are especially sensitive to climate change impacts. In addition, environmental factors other than direct temperature increase might play an important role in functioning of these keystone aquatic communities. We examined 31 lakes at the treeline ecotone in subarctic Finnish Lapland for their surface sediment chironomid fauna to assess the influence of different environmental factors on the communities. We aim to improve understanding of the climate-driven catchment and limnological factors, for the assessment of climate change impacts. Our results indicated that organic content of the sediment, total nitrogen, water depth and…
How ocean acidification can benefit calcifiers.
2017
Reduction in seawater pH due to rising levels of anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO2) in the world's oceans is a major force set to shape the future of marine ecosystems and the ecological services they provide [1,2]. In particular, ocean acidification is predicted to have a detrimental effect on the physiology of calcifying organisms [3]. Yet, the indirect effects of ocean acidification on calcifying organisms, which may counter or exacerbate direct effects, is uncertain. Using volcanic CO2 vents, we tested the indirect effects of ocean acidification on a calcifying herbivore (gastropod) within the natural complexity of an ecological system. Contrary to predictions, the abundance of this cal…
Current and Future Influence of Environmental Factors on Small Pelagic Fish Distributions in the Northwestern Mediterranean Sea
2020
Managing for the Future: Understanding the Relative Roles of Climate and Fishing on Structure and Dynamics of Marine Ecosystems.-- 20 pages, 15 figures, supplementary material https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2020.00622/full#supplementary-material