Search results for "oceanography"

Rich fen development in CE Europe, resilience to climate change and human impact over the last ca. 3500 years

2017

Here, for the first time in SE Poland, we document the long-term development of a rich fen and assess its sensitivity to climate change and human impacts over the last ca. 3500 years. Our results are based on a high-resolution, continuous plant macrofossil remains, mollusc and pollen record, complemented by geochemical, mineral magnetic and physical characterisation, and radiocarbon dating from Bagno Serebryskie rich fen located in SE Poland. Based on the palaeoecological data we distinguished five stages of wet habitat conditions: 5000–3300, 2800–2150, 1600–1100, 750–230, 150–10 cal yr BP and five dry periods at ca. 3300–2800, 2150–1600, 1100–750, 230–150, 10 to − 64 cal yr BP. The pollen …

Vegetation dynamics of Kisima Ngeda freshwater spring reflect hydrological changes in northern Tanzania over the past 1200 years: implications for pa…

2021

13 pages; International audience; Kisima Ngeda (KN), a spring on the northern margin of saline Lake Eyasi, Tanzania, sustains an Acacia-Hyphaene palm woodland and Typha swamps, while the surrounding vegetation is semi-desert. To study the vegetation changes associated with this spring, which represents a plausible modern analog for the fossil springs documented in the nearby paleoanthropological and archaeological sites of Olduvai Gorge, we analyzed the pollen content of a 43 cm-long sediment core that documents vegetation changes since the last ~1200 years (from cal yrs. C.E. 841 to 2011). Our results show that (1) Hyphaene palms, which require meso-halophytic soil conditions were most abu…

Rereading a tree-ring database to illustrate depositional histories of subfossil trees

2017

Late Quaternary tree-ring chronologies have been constructed using data collected from subfossil trees preserved under favourable conditions in lake sediments and peat deposits. Tree-ring widths and densities are commonly used for reconstructions of past climate variability. An alternative way of using these data is to explore the replication curves of these chronologies. Here, we make use of previously collected data that is currently available from tree-ring databases to demonstrate the depositional histories of pine trees once accumulated into the sediment in lake (i.e., riparian trees) and peatland sites. Divergent courses of depositional histories were obtained for different sedimentar…

Amphibians and reptiles as palaeonvironmental proxies during the Late Pleistocene (MIS3): The case of Stratigraphic Unit V of El Salt, Alcoi, Spain

2021

The locality of El Salt (Alcoi, Spain) is a key site for understanding the extirpation of Neanderthals in the eastern part of Iberia. In this paper, we analyse an assemblage of amphibians and reptiles from Stratigraphic Unit V (45.2 ± 3.4 ka to 44.7 ± 3.4 ka), which corresponds to one of the last regional records of Neanderthals, to improve knowledge of the palaeoecology and palaeoclimate of this event. The assemblage comprises three anurans (Pelodytes sp., Alytes obstetricans, and Epidalea calamita), two lizards (Lacertidae indet. and Chalcides bedriagai), and five snakes (Colubridae indet., Coronella sp., Coronella sp./Zamenis sp., Natrix maura, and Vipera latastei). Palaeoclimatic recons…

Using growth and geochemical composition of Clathromorphum compactum to track multiscale North Atlantic hydro-climate variability

2020

International audience; Records of ocean/atmosphere dynamics over the past centuries are essential to understand processes driving climate variability. This is particularly true for the Northwest Atlantic which is a key region with an essential role in global climate regulation. Over the past two decades, coralline red algae have been increasingly used as environmental and climatic archives for the marine realm and hold the potential to extend long-term instrumental measurements. Here, we investigate the possibility to extract climate and environmental information from annual growth patterns and geochemical composition of the coralline red algae, Clathromorphum compactum, from Saint-Pierre …

2020

Skeletal remains in archaeological strata are often assumed to be of similar ages. Here we show that combined Sr and O isotope analyses can serve as a powerful tool for assessing fish provenance and even for identifying fossil fish teeth in archaeological contexts. For this purpose, we established a reference Sr and O isotope dataset of extant fish teeth from major water bodies in the Southern Levant. Fossil shark teeth were identified within Iron Age cultural layers dating to 8–9th century BCE in the City of David, Jerusalem, although the reason for their presence remains unclear. Their enameloid 87Sr/86Sr and δ18OPO4 values [0.7075 ± 0.0001 (1 SD, n = 7) and 19.6 ± 0.9‰ (1 SD, n = 6), res…

Micro-PIXE/PIGE analysis of Palaeolithic mammoth ivory: Potential chemical markers of provenance and relative dating

2014

Abstract Micro-Proton Induced X-ray and Gamma-ray Emission (micro-PIXE/PIGE) provide non-destructive methods for the evaluation of the major, minor and trace element compositions of archaeological material. The current study applies micro-PIXE/PIGE analysis to mammoth ivory artefacts from four Palaeolithic sites (Abri Castanet, Vogelherd Cave, Grottes de la Verpilliere I and II) in France and Germany in order to assess the effectiveness of this approach to material older than 30,000 y BP. It has thus far not been established whether such methods of analysis can yield results of scientific and archaeological interest on ivory material that has undergone such extended periods of diagenesis. T…

The Uniqueness of Planktonic Ecosystems in the Mediterranean Sea: The Response to Orbital- and Suborbital-Climatic Forcing over the Last 130,000 Years

2016

AbstractThe Mediterranean Sea is an ideal location to test the response of organisms to hydrological transformations driven by climate change. Here we review studies carried out on planktonic foraminifera and coccolithophores during the late Quaternary and attempt the comparison of data scattered in time and space. We highlight the prompt response of surface water ecosystems to both orbital- and suborbital-climatic variations.A markedly different spatial response was observed in calcareous plankton assemblages, possibly due to the influence of the North Atlantic climatic system in the western, central and northern areas and of the monsoon system in the easternmost and southern sites. Orbita…

Ammonite paleobiogeography during the Pliensbachian-Toarcian crisis (Early Jurassic) reflecting paleoclimate, eustasy, and extinctions.

2011

14 pages; International audience; The Pliensbachian-Toarcian crisis (Early Jurassic) is one of the major Mesozoic paleoecological disturbances when ca. 20% of marine and continental families went extinct. Contemporaneously, profound paleobiogeographical changes occurred in most oceanic domains including a disruption of ammonite provincialism during the Early Toarcian. Here, we quantitatively reappraise the structure and evolution of paleobiogeographical patterns displayed by ammonite faunas before, during, and after the biological crisis, over a time-interval including 13 biochronozones. The high-resolution study presented here involves the use of hierarchical Cluster Analyses, non-metric M…

Paleoclimate and extensional tectonics of short-lived lacustrine environments. Lower Cretaceous of the Panormide Southern Tethyan carbonate platform …

2017

Abstract Subaerial erosion and continental sedimentation interbedded with shallow-water carbonates are unequivocal stratigraphic records to evaluate paleoenvironmental and paleoclimate evolution of emerged landmass. Stratigraphic analysis of the Cretaceous Monte Gallo section of the Mesozoic Panormide carbonate platform, in the northern side of the Palermo Mountains (NW Sicily) records a peculiar continental-derived clays that interrupted the shallow-water carbonate sedimentation. These clays rest, with lenticular geometries, above the tectonically-enhanced subaerial erosional unconformity of the Barremian-Lower Aptian Requienid limestones and are covered by the Upper Cretaceous Rudistid li…