palaeoecology and archaeology of the karlich seeufer open air site middle pleistocene in the central rhineland germany abstract the karlich seeufer archaeological site in germany s central rhineland was excavated between 1980 and 1992 the site provides evidence for hominid activity during a middle pleistocene interglaciation known up to now only from the karlich clay pit and therefore defined as the karlich interglaciation which is considered to be post cromer iv and pre holstein sensu stricto in age the site is characterized by acheulean artifacts a fauna dominated byelephas palaeoloxodon antiquus and a unique and outstanding preservation of wooden and other palaeobotanical remains assuming all finds are associated the site previously was interpreted as an elephant hunting camp with a wooden structure together with wood and bone implements preservedin situ recent analysis of the same features has shown that the site can also be interpreted as a reworked archaeological sample hominid occupation occurred in the vicinity of a small lake with prevailing meso oligotrophic conditions expanding boreal forests and fen vegetation characterized the landscape

evidence of the present relative land stability of venice italy from land sea and space observations 1 the city of venice is very vulnerable to loss in surface elevation as a result of subsidence and eustacy because of its small elevation above sea level the alarm of the scientific community related to this persistent problem is increasing because of the forecasts of sea level rise caused by global warming in order to evaluate the present relative subsidence of venice a study has been performed by combining high precision leveling satellite radar interferometry sri and tide gauge measurements the analysis of the most recent data points out with an unprecedented detail the present ground stability of the city

the oldest handaxes in europe fact or artefact abstract hominin presence is well documented in a number of early pleistocene and early middle pleistocene european localities however the evidence currently available indicates that acheulean handaxes spread in the fluvial basins of western europe during mis 11 400 kyr ago associated with homo heidelbergensis although a number of early middle pleistocene acheulean assemblages have been dated from mis 16 onwards for this reason the magnetostratigraphic dating in southeast spain of two archaeological localities the open air site of solana del zamborino sz and the rock shelter site of cueva negra del estrecho del quipar eq that put back the appearance of handaxes to the early middle pleistocene limit scott and gibert 2009 is of particular interest as the new ages suggest that h heidelbergensis was a contemporary of h antecessor that had the ability to produce levallois debitage and to control fire during the early middle pleistocene transition however we have detected a number of errors in the interpretation of the archaeological assemblage from the first site as well as striking discrepancies with the original faunal lists published for both localities with several large mammal species that are omitted or arbitrarily changed to make the assemblages consistent with the new ages deduced from magnetostratigraphy for this reason we suggest that 1 the finding of reverse polarity in the sediments sampled for paleomagnetism in sz may simply record one of the polarity reversals that took place during the brunhes chron although the use by scott and gibert 2009 of a composite stratigraphic column precludes correlating these levels with a specific reversal and 2 the fauna and tools of eq correspond to the late middle pleistocene sedimentary infillings of this karst site while the samples taken for paleomagnetism belong to a previous sedimentary cycle during the matuyama chron such interpretations would be in better agreement with the age estimates provided by biostratigraphy and also with the currently accepted chronology for the appearance of acheulean industries in western europe

paleomagnetic age for hominid fossils at atapuerca archaeological site spain a paleomagnetic investigation at the gran dolina site excavation atapuerca spain shows that the sediments containing the recently discovered human occupation were deposited more than 780 000 years ago near the time of the matuyama brunhes boundary forty one oriented samples were obtained from 22 sites along an 18 meter section of the gran dolina karst filling the lower 16 sites displayed reversed polarity magnetizations whereas the upper six sites were normal the reversal spans the hominid finds at stratigraphic level td6 the aurora stratum and these hominid fossils are therefore the oldest in southern europe

mediterranean thermohaline response to large scale winter atmospheric forcing in a high resolution ocean model simulation large scale circulation anomalies over the north atlantic and euro mediterranean regions described by dominant climate modes such as the north atlantic oscillation nao the east atlantic pattern ea the east atlantic western russian eawr and the mediterranean oscillation index moi significantly affect interannual to decadal climatic and hydroclimatic variability in the euro mediterranean region however whereas previous studies assessed the impact of such climate modes on air sea heat and freshwater fluxes in the mediterranean sea the propagation of these atmospheric forcing signals from the surface toward the interior and the abyss of the mediterranean sea remains unexplored here we use a high resolution ocean model simulation covering the 1979 2013 period to investigate spatial patterns and time scales of the mediterranean thermohaline response to winter forcing from nao ea eawr and moi we find that these modes significantly imprint on the thermohaline properties in key areas of the mediterranean sea through a variety of mechanisms typically density anomalies induced by all modes remain confined in the upper 600 m depth and remain significant for up to 18 24 months one of the clearest propagation signals refers to the ea in the adriatic and northern ionian seas there negative ea anomalies are associated to an extensive positive density response with anomalies that sink to the bottom of the south adriatic pit within a 2 year time other strong responses are the thermally driven responses to the ea in the gulf of lions and to the eawr in the aegean sea moi and eawr forcing of thermohaline properties in the eastern mediterranean sub basins seems to be determined by reinforcement processes linked to the persistency of these modes in multiannual anomalous states our study also suggests that nao ea eawr and moi could critically interfere with internal deep and abyssal ocean dynamics and variability in the mediterranean sea

the earliest acheulean technology at atapuerca burgos spain oldest levels of the galeria site gii unit abstract this work presents a study of the oldest acheulean lithic assemblages from the galeria site specifically the giia subunit which has been dated to c 503 95 ka and compares them with the subsequent subunit in the sequence giib dated to around 237 269 ka the main goals of this study are to offer a detailed technological characterization of the earliest acheulean presence in atapuerca and to assess the elements determining the technological variability in a given site by studying the sequence evaluating the concept of variability and defining the aspects which determine it the galeria site does not display the features of a living space it is a cave which was accessed by both humans and carnivores in order to obtain the animal biomass of the herbivores that had fallen down into the cave through a natural shaft the archaeological record is therefore incomplete and fragmented since it is the product of highly changeable occupational dynamics in the lower galeria levels we identified the development from an almost exclusive use of cobbles as blanks for knapping activities in the earliest periods to an increasing use of flakes in terms of raw materials the initially predominant use of neogene chert and quartzite evolved towards a more balanced use of six raw materials furthermore there was an increase in the size of the large tools after comparing these two acheulean assemblages it is important to put them into context by taking into account a the significance of cobbles and flakes as blanks b the significance of cleavers and c the use of raw materials such as quartzite sandstone or chert these aspects have traditionally been used to facilitate comparisons of the technologies used within the iberian peninsula and comparisons between the acheulean technology of the iberian peninsula and north africa and the european i e trans pyrenean acheulean technology

internal and external sources of mean sea level variations the joint variation of monthly mean sea level rainfall and evaporation recorded in naples and in other western mediterranean stations is analyzed the mass balance among sea level rainfall and evaporation and the application of the wiener filter methods show that the major portion of sea level variance concentrated at annual and semiannual components is dominated by evaporation the effect of rainfall is less than the effect of evaporation the atlantic water flux acts as a balancing source of sea level fluctuations among those of rainfall and evaporation

use and re use re knapped flakes from the mode 1 site of fuente nueva 3 orce andalucia spain the presence of some flaked flakes at the mode 1 site of fuente nueva 3 1 2 ma poses the problem of the use and re use of flakes as cores for obtaining smaller cutting tools the industry is characterized by small flint flakes and cores as well as by numerous limestone heavy duty tools both of the raw materials were collected from local alluvial and colluvial sources the assemblage presents a significant dimensional dichotomy with on the one hand large sized limestone percussion tools and on the other hand small sized flint debitage flint plates blocks or nodules were obtained from local secondary deposits there are very few flint cores and the average flake size is only 3 cm some of the flakes display opposite ventral surfaces indicating that they were obtained from larger flakes used as cores in addition a few intensively exploited flint cores conserve convex surfaces corresponding to their original flake matrices no appreciably large sized flint flakes have so far been found at the site suggesting that some phases of the knapping sequences were carried out further away however a few flakes could have been expediently re knapped in situ what can this behavioural choice tell us about early hominin behaviour at fuente nueva 3 the re use of flint flakes as makeshift cores implies a two step operative scheme involving the choice of a suitable blank that was further reduced on site this raises questions about raw material transport during the earliest periods of european mode 1

reassessing the age of atapuerca td6 spain new paleomagnetic results we carry out a new paleomagnetic study across stratigraphic layer td7 of gran dolina site atapuerca and reassess the existing absolute ages thermoluminescence electron spin resonance obtained at this site the new and more detailed magnetostratigraphic record of the matuyama brunhes boundary combined with absolute ages enables further constraint on the age of the underlying human bearing level or aurora stratum paleomagnetism of the studied silts and sandstones reveals stable dual polarity characteristic remanent magnetization directions a new normal magnetic polarity short interval is found at several consecutive sampling localities in the upper part of td7 providing a new ante quem date for the human bearing sediments of 0 9 ma possibly formed during mis 25

on correlations between the north atlantic oscillation geopotential heights and geomagnetic activity we investigate correlations between geomagnetic activity indices thenorth atlantic oscillation nao and stratospheric geopotentialheights it is shown that the correlation between the geomagnetic indexap and the nao index is high and significant since about 1970 that itis significant during winter only that it was not significant beforeabout 1970 and that the correlations are dominated by quasi decadalscales of variability analysis of the spatial pattern of correlations restricted to the northern hemisphere and wintertime shows thatsignificant correlations between ap and sea level pressures and betweenap and stratospheric geopotential heights are found for the period1973 2000 however for the period 1949 1972 no significant correlationsare found at the surface while significant correlations still are foundin the stratosphere this might indicate that a solar forcing primarilyacting in the stratosphere is propagating its influence downward in thelater period but not in the earlier less

water mass characteristics in the deep layers of the western ionian basin observed during may 2003 1 ctd measurements carried out in the southern adriatic sea and in the western ionian basin eurafrican mediterranean sea during may 2003 by the german research vessel poseidon poseidon cruise 298 and numerical simulations are used to elucidate aspects of the abyssal circulation of this oceanic region the observations reveal that dense waters of adriatic origin were strongly diluted along their way on the italian continental slope whilst their characteristics remained better preserved in a region located further east numerical simulations carried out by means of a nonlinear reduced gravity plume model confirm the observations and contribute to explain their cause the very steep topographic slope along the italian shelf in the region of the gulf of taranto induces strong entrainment of intermediate waters in the bottom layers instead the bottom waters of adriatic origin which along their path further east encounter gentler topographic variations are weakly diluted by turbulent mixing and therefore better preserve their original characteristics the remarkable differences in the simulated turbulent mixing along these two different paths are accentuated by the presence of a noticeable zonal gradient of potential density existing in the near bottom layers of the northern ionian basin

the early acheulean technology of barranc de la boella catalonia spain abstract since 2007 excavations at barranc de la boella tarragona catalonia spain have revealed three localities with rich archaeo paleontological assemblages la mina el forn and pit 1 palaeontology palaeomagnetism and cosmogenic analyses have dated these localities to close to 1 ma the presence of mammuthus meridionalis hippopotamus antiquus stephanorhinus cf hundsheimensis mimomys savini and victoriamys chalinei stand out in the sample of macro and micro mammals the lithic assemblages from the three sites are made up of percussion cobbles choppers chopper cores cores simple flakes and some retouched flakes mainly denticulates and notches in the case of the el forn and pit 1 localities two large cutting tools have been recovered a cleaver like tool and a pick made of hard wearing schist the lithic assemblage of pit 1 which includes several refitting lithic sets is closely associated with the remains of a young adult mammuthus meridionalis in a clear butchering site context this evidence suggests that barranc de la boella is the oldest european early acheulean site and one of the oldest butchering site on the subcontinent during the late early pleistocene the study of the variability among these three localities in similar environmental conditions together with information from other sites are discussed in order to gain further knowledge about the appearance of the acheulean in europe and its continuity or discontinuity in relation to pre existing technologies

off shelf fluxes across the southern adriatic margin factors controlling dense water driven transport phenomena abstract the northern adriatic sea is a basin where dense shelf waters form during winters if the following favorable conditions are attained high salinities mainly related to low river water discharge po river in primis during fall season and strong heat fluxes induced by cold and dry bora wind events blowing from north east extremely favorable conditions to northern adriatic dense waters naddw formation characterized winter 2012 when following several months of low po river runoff a strong event of cold air outbreak cao occurred from the end of january until mid february consequently the mean temperature of northern adriatic waters dropped to about 6 c and exceptional densities potential density anomaly locally exceeding 30 0 kg m 3 were reached the production and spreading mechanisms of dense water in the adriatic sea have been modeled by means of the coawst coupled ocean atmosphere wave sediment transport modeling system the model builds upon a high resolution 1 km spaced horizontal grid fully 3 d primitive equations hydrodynamic model coupled with a phase averaged wave model and sediment routines and is driven by simulated atmospheric forcings the dataset used to assess model outputs relies on the measurements acquired during the dedicated field campaigns operation dense water a set of two rapid response cruises carried out in southern adriatic during winter 2012 and by five mooring arrays deployed in the southern adriatic margin sam that allowed the continuous acquisition of temperature salinity currents and suspended matter samples results from the integrated data model approach suggest that the naddw propagates along the shelf to the southern basin following both a shallower vein and a deeper stream with a process characterized by a strong variability mean value of 0 31 sv with peaks rapidly growing in the first weeks after the cao up to 2 19 sv additionally coawst capability to couple different numerical models allowed to disentangle the relative importance of aspects on dense water generation mixing and spreading demonstrating how coupled runs can lead to volumes up to 50 larger with respect to uncoupled simulations additional light is shed on the transport pathways off the shelf and on possible sediment transport phenomena in the area in this benefiting from an unprecedented spatial resolution and a new bathymetry reflecting very high resolution data acquired via multi beam techniques although dense water propagation appears as a relatively large scale process involving the whole western side of the sam topographic local discontinuities and seabed slopes appear crucial in triggering descent and governing flow patterns the presence of suspended sediment along the water column despite not significantly influencing the overall fluxes across sections is responsible of pulling part of the veins towards deeper zones

a 20th century acceleration in global sea level rise 1 multi century sea level records and climate models indicate an acceleration of sea level rise but no 20th century acceleration has previously been detected a reconstruction of global sea level using tide gauge data from 1950 to 2000 indicates a larger rate of rise after 1993 and other periods of rapid sea level rise but no significant acceleration over this period here we extend the reconstruction of global mean sea level back to 1870 and find a sea level rise from january 1870 to december 2004 of 195 mm a 20th century rate of sea level rise of 1 7 0 3 mm yr 1 and a significant acceleration of sea level rise of 0 013 0 006 mm yr 2 this acceleration is an important confirmation of climate change simulations which show an acceleration not previously observed if this acceleration remained constant then the 1990 to 2100 rise would range from 280 to 340 mm consistent with projections in the ipcc tar

transient eastern mediterranean deep waters in response to the massive dense water output of the aegean sea in the 1990s abstract we present a detailed account of the changing hydrography and the large scale circulation of the deep waters of the eastern mediterranean emed that resulted from the unique high volume influx of dense waters from the aegean sea during the 1990s and of the changes within the aegean that initiated the event the so called eastern mediterranean transient emt the analysis uses repeated hydrographic and transient tracer surveys of the emed in 1987 1991 1995 1999 and 2001 2002 hydrographic time series in the southern aegean and southern adriatic seas and further scattered data aegean outflow averaged nearly 3 10 6 m 3 s 1 between mid 1992 and late 1994 and was largest during 1993 when south and west of crete aegean influenced deep waters extended upwards to 400 m depth emt related aegean outflow prior to 1992 confined to the region around crete and to 1800 m depth wise amounted to about 3 of the total outflow outflow after 1994 up to 2001 2002 derived from the increasing inventory of the tracer cfc 12 contributed 20 to the total of 2 8 10 14 m 3 densities in the southern aegean sea deep waters rose by 0 2 kg m 3 between 1987 and 1993 and decreased more slowly thereafter the aegean waters delivered via the principal exit pathway in kasos strait east of crete propagated westward along the cretan slope such that in 1995 the highest densities were observed in the hellenic trench west of crete aegean influenced waters also crossed the east mediterranean ridge south of crete and from there expanded eastward into the southeastern levantine sea transfer into the ionian mostly followed the hellenic trench largely up to the trench s northern end at about 37 n from there the waters spread further west while mixing with the resident waters additional transfer occurred through the herodotus trough in the south levantine waters after 1994 consistently showed temperature salinity t s inversions in roughly 1000 1700 m depth with amplitudes decreasing in time the t s distributions in the ionian sea were more diverse one cause being added aegean outflow of relatively lower density through the antikithira strait west of crete spreading of the aegean influenced waters was quite swift such that by early 1995 the entire emed was affected and strong mixing is indicated by near linear t s relationships observed in various places referenced to 2000 and 3000 dbar the highest aegean generated densities observed during the event equaled those generated by adriatic sea outflow in the northern ionian sea prior to the emt a precarious balance between the two dense water source areas is thus indicated a feedback is proposed which helped triggering the change from a dominating adriatic source to the aegean source but at the same time supported the previous long year dominance of the adriatic the emed deep waters will remain transient for decades to come

a large abrupt change in the abyssal water masses of the eastern mediterranean 1 in this letter we report observations showing for the first time the occurrence of a new major transformation in the thermohaline cell of the eastern mediterranean sea after 2 decades during which waters of aegean origin dominated the abyssal layers of that basin the adriatic sea has returned to represent a major source of eastern mediterranean deep water emdw the observed characteristics of such water however profoundly differ from those observed previously in the abyssal layers of the ionian basin in fact the newly formed emdw we observed there is saltier warmer and denser than emdw observed before and during the eastern mediterranean transient emt thus during the past 2 decades the thermohaline cell of the eastern mediterranean once considered steady showed two large abrupt somehow opposite fluctuations as in the case of the first one origins climatic implications and fate of this second fluctuation have to be clarified

evaluating the suitability of extended range luminescence dating techniques over early and middle pleistocene timescales published datasets and case studies from atapuerca spain the emergence of alternative luminescence dating techniques such as thermally transferred optically stimulated luminescence tt osl post infrared infrared stimulated luminescence pir irsl and osl dating of individual quartz supergrains has opened up new possibilities for establishing numerical age control on sedimentary deposits that exceed the traditional upper age limits of quartz osl dating in this study we evaluate the reliability of these extended range luminescence dating techniques over middle and early pleistocene timescales using two approaches i a broad scale synthesis of extended range luminescence chronologies published so far as part of known age comparison studies ii a series of new tt osl and pir irsl case studies at the palaeoanthropological sites of galeria sima del elefante and gran dolina atapuerca spain the published known age tt osl datasets n 82 and supergrain osl datasets n 3 display good correspondence i e suitably linear and proportion relationships with associated age control the known age pir irsl datasets n 228 display more inter sample scatter though there is general support for the reliability of more stringent pir irsl protocols and multiple elevated temperature pir irsl approaches over late and middle pleistocene timescales while these reliability assessments are encouraging there remains a clear need for more widespread known age empirical assessments of extended range luminescence techniques beyond 300 400 ka the ages obtained at atapuerca using single grain tt osl and pir irsl measurement temperatures of 225 c pir ir225 are in agreement with independent age control over an age range spanning 240 930 ka in contrast the pir irsl chronologies obtained using a more stringent measurement temperature of 290 c pir ir290 consistently overestimate the expected ages of the atapuerca sequences the single grain tt osl ages obtained at gran dolina permit calculation of a new weighted mean age of 846 57 ka for the homo antecessor palaeoanthropological horizon unit td6 the known age atapuerca case studies highlight the feasibility and advantages of applying tt osl dating at the single grain scale of analysis and demonstrate that the suitability of pir irsl dating protocols can vary significantly at a site or regional scale together our analyses show that no single extended range luminescence dating technique is likely to be universally applicable to all samples collectively however these approaches offer good potential for obtaining reliable chronologies and they are likely to offer the greatest benefits when applied in tandem to individual samples

nao ocean circulation interactions in a coupled general circulation model the interplay between the north atlantic oscillation nao and the large scale ocean circulation is inspected in a twentieth century simulation conducted with a state of the art coupled general circulation model sig nificant lead lag covariance between oceanic and tropospheric variables suggests that the system supports a damped oscillatory mode involving an active ocean atmosphere coupling with a typical nao like space structure and a 5 years timescale qualitatively consistent with a mid latitude delayed oscillator paradigm the two essential processes governing the oscillation are 1 a negative feedback between ocean gyre circulation and the high latitude sst meridional gradient and 2 a positive feedback between sst and the nao the atmospheric nao pattern appears to have a weaker projection on the ocean meridional overturning compared to the gyre cir culation which leads to a secondary role for the thermohaline circulation in driving the meridional heat transport and thus the oscillatory mode

early paleolithic of korolevo site transcarpathia ukraine abstract the most ancient in situ palaeolithic industries in ukraine are known from the multi layer palaeolithic site of korolevo in transcarpathia along the tisza river the korolevo site was excavated from 1974 to the early 1990s the palaeolithic artefacts were related to a complex loess palaeosol succession on top of a volcanic mount above the present day alluvial plain in the eastern sector beyvar abundant lithic implements were collected in various excavation areas but the loess palaeosol succession was often limited or discontinuous in the northern sector gostry verkh the loess palaesol sequence reached a total thickness of 14 m although the palaeolithic assemblages were poorly documented huge middle and early palaeolithic collections were mainly produced on local raw material andesite at gostry verkh the reference stratigraphic sequence of korolevo encompasses a complex succession of loamy units alternating with seven palaeosols the brunhes matuyama boundary was fixed at the base of palaeosol vii the 15 cultural chronological complexes were further positioned within the pedosedimentary sequence taking into account their inferred stratigraphic background as well as the degree of weathering of the lithics the earliest assemblages were distributed respectively in the upper part of palaeosol vii complex vi and within the alluvial deposits prior to the brunhes matuyama boundary complexes vii and viii a new section opened at gostry verkh has allowed a complementary reading of the sequence in this way the reproducibility of the main pedosedimentary units previously described could be tested as well as the presence of reversed magnetisation palaeoclimatic analysis of the sequence has been improved by micromorphological analysis of the main pedological units the new research also aimed at providing better control of the stratigraphic positioning of the cultural assemblages consequently five middle and early paleolithic assemblages were discarded including complex viii as their situation regarding the local pedosedimentary context is poorly documented at present in korolevo only levels vi and vii were determined to be early paleolithic

teleconnections force interannual to decadal tidal variability in the lagoon of venice northern adriatic 1 in the present investigation for the first time fundamental characteristics of autumn and winter average sequences of sea level heights slh that were recorded in the lagoon of venice northern adriatic in the mediterranean sea during the period 1872 2004 are investigated interannual to decadal variability of venetian slh is found to reflect the variability of the most prominent euro atlantic teleconnections eats in particular the north atlantic oscillation nao the east atlantic western russian and the scandinavian patterns are found to contribute to generate the 5 year 8 year and 22 year peaks that dominate the spectra of seasonal venetian slh among the possible oceanic and atmospheric phenomena downscaling interannual to decadal large scale atmospheric signals into the observed variability in the venetian slh we explore inverse barometer effect wind driven setup and the thermohaline circulation of both the adriatic and the mediterranean seas all these phenomena are assessed to display some of the typical features of the shared interannual to decadal variability of both venetian slh and eats our analysis shows also that the decadal variability of winter venetian slh is closely linked with variations in solar activity in particular the winter slh multidecadal pattern is found to be correlated with very high statistical confidence to the hale cycles pattern 22 years which describes the series of sunspot cycles with alternating opposite polarity the marked signature of hale cycles on the leading mode of multidecadal sea level pressure winter variability which is practically indistinguishable from the inverse wintertime nao is also detailed to further support the hypothesis of a sun venetian slh association

one million years of cultural evolution in a stable environment at atapuerca burgos spain abstract the present paper analyses the evidence provided by three sites sima del elefante gran dolina and galeria located in the trinchera del ferrocarril of the sierra de atapuerca these three sites are cave infillings that contain sediments deposited from approximately 1 2 ma to 200 kyr pollen herpetofauna and small and large mammal remains are used as proxies to obtain a general picture of the environmental changes that occurred at the sierra de atapuerca throughout the one million year period represented at these sites similarly cultural changes are tracked analyzing the evidence of human behavior obtained from the study of several bone and lithic assemblages from these three sites at least three periods with different cultural features involving technology subsistence and behavior are determined from the available evidence the first two periods correspond to the mode 1 technology and homo antecessor the first is dated around 1 2 to 1 0 ma and reflects opportunistic behavior both in technology and subsistence the second period is around 800 kyr bp mode 1 technology is still maintained but subsistence strategies include systematic hunting and the use of base camps the third period is dated between 500 ka and 200 ka and corresponds to the mode 2 technology and the acquisition of directional hunting and other organizational strategies by homo heidelbergensis a transition from mode 2 to mode 3 seems to appear at the end of this time range and may reflect the early phases of a fourth cultural change with regard to the environment our main conclusion is that there was an absence of extremely harsh conditions at atapuerca throughout this time period the presence of mediterranean taxa was constant and the dominant landscape was a savannah like open environment probably with small forest patches an alternation of mediterranean and mesic species as the dominant component of the tree storey was induced by the climatic cycles and steppes spread across the landscape during the drier periods in any case it is not possible to establish clear cut off points separating entirely different environmental episodes our results show no evidence of any relationship between environmental change and cultural change at the sierra de atapuerca

barranc de la boella catalonia spain an acheulean elephant butchering site from the european late early pleistocene evidence of late early pleistocene elephant butchery activity has been excavated in the pit 1 locality at barranc de la boella catalonia spain the fossil assemblage mainly comprises the remains of one prime adult individual of mammuthus meridionalis together with 125 lithic artefacts among which several refitting groups of chert have been identified the lithic assemblage from the pit 1 locality is composed of cobbles cores simple and retouched flakes together with a large well fashioned pick of hard wearing schist spatial zooarchaeological taphonomic technical and use wear analyses confirm that the occupation was devoted to butchery of the mammoth carcass the activity zone is in a fluvio deltaic area that incises the terrace t 60 of the lower francoli river basin 50 m a s l palaeomagnetic and cosmogenic analyses as well as microfaunal mimomys savini victoriamys chalinei and macrofaunal biostratigraphy mammuthus meridionalis support the timing of the occupation to the late matuyama chron these various lines of evidence point to barranc de la boella being the oldest early acheulean butchering site in europe ongoing excavations at several localities at barranc de la boella are yielding new data on the palaeoenvironmental geochronological and technological framework of these occupations finally the evidence is integrated into current understanding of the subsistence strategies practised by early pleistocene hominins

a possible solar pacemaker for holocene fluctuations of a salt marsh in southern italy abstract this study is aimed at verifying the possible influence of solar activity on the coastal vegetation development in the tavoliere plain south adriatic region italy between 6350 and 4000 cal bp when regular fluctuations of halophilic vegetation are recorded by pollen a wavelet analysis applied to the percentage values of glasswort vegetation is consistent with periodicities of solar activity and other palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimate proxies in the literature a comparison of salt marsh pollen indicators salicornia type and ruppia maritima with the 10be dataset from the greenland ice core gisp2 on the basis of their independent chronologies reveals a strong visual correlation indicating that the minima of salt marsh percentages match minima in the 10be curve corresponding to solar activity maxima associated with warm and arid phases at the middle latitudes the tavoliere salt marsh appears to have contracted during the arid warm phases associated to maxima of solar activity and to have expanded during the wet cold phases of solar minima this coastal area characterized by a very flat topography and arid climate appears to have been very sensitive to even minor hydrological and climate changes changes of solar activity determining extensive environmental transformations were also possibly responsible for the abandonment of the human coastal settlements of one of the most important neolithic archaeological districts of italy

the use of quartz during the lower palaeolithic in northeastern iberia abstract this article analyses the use of quartz as a raw material during the lower palaeolithic in the northeast of the iberian peninsula we studied the use of quartz at 9 sites with chronologies ranging from the end of the early pleistocene to the end of the middle pleistocene quartz was used in all assemblages studied and was always collected close to the sites most of all in the form of pebbles from river basins there was a differential selection of raw materials including quartz according to the technical strategy that humans wanted to implement despite the apparent simplicity of operational schemes carried out using quartz we found factors that point to a remarkable conceptual complexity in the handling of this rock as for example knowledge of the characteristics and mechanical possibilities of quartz and the adaptation of operational schemes to the properties of this raw material

the 29 september 2009 samoa islands tsunami simulations based on the first focal mechanism solutions and implications on tsunami early warning strategies the tsunamigenic earthquake mw 8 1 that occurred on 29 september 2009 at 17 48 utc offshore of the samoa archipelago east of the tonga trench represents an example of the so called outer rise earthquakes the areas most affected were the south coasts of western and american samoa where almost 200 people were killed and run up heights were measured in excess of 5 m at several locations along the coast moreover tide gauge records showed a maximum peak to peak height of about 3 5 m near pago pago american samoa and of 1 5 m offshore of apia western samoa in this work different fault models based on the focal mechanism solutions proposed by global cmt and by usgs immediately after the 2009 samoan earthquake are tested by comparing the near field recorded signals three offshore dart buoys and two coastal tide gauges and the synthetic signals provided by the numerical simulations the analysis points out that there are lights and shadows in the sense that none of the computed tsunamis agrees satisfactorily with all the considered signals although some of them reproduce some of the records quite well this partial agreement and partial disagreement are analysed in the perspective of tsunami forecast and of tsunami early warning system strategy