palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimatic reconstruction of the latest pleistocene holocene sequence from grotta del romito calabria southern italy using the small mammal assemblages abstract the habitat weighting method the simpson diversity index and the mutual climatic range method are applied to the small mammal assemblage of grotta del romito southern italy in order to reconstruct the environmental and climatic fluctuations that occurred during the latest pleistocene holocene sequence of the cave the analysed strata have a discontinuous chronological range from the middle late gravettian ca 24 ka uncal bp to the mesolithic sauveterrian still radiometrically undated gravettian and epigravettian layers were excavated inside the cave mesolithic layers in the rockshelter outside the cave the small mammal assemblage shows significant differences along the sequence a turning point is detected in strata d29 d11 coinciding with the end of heinrich event 1 h1 and the beginning of the bolling allerod interstadial between ca 14 9 14 ka cal bp these data are in accordance with the previously obtained environmental data for grotta del romito as well as with other continental climatic and environmental changes detected at a regional scale

formal definition and dating of the gssp global stratotype section and point for the base of the holocene using the greenland ngrip ice core and selected auxiliary records the greenland ice core from northgrip ngrip contains a proxy climate record across the pleistocene holocene boundary of unprecedented clarity and resolution analysis of an array of physical and chemical parameters within the ice enables the base of the holocene as reflected in the first signs of climatic warming at the end of the younger dryas greenland stadial 1 cold phase to be located with a high degree of precision this climatic event is most clearly reflected in an abrupt shift in deuterium excess values accompanied by more gradual changes in d 18 o dust concentration a range of chemical species and annual layer thickness a timescale based on multi parameter annual layer counting provides an age of 11 700 calendar yr b2 k before ad 2000 for the base of the holocene with a maximum counting error of 99 yr a proposal that an archived core from this unique sequence should constitute the global stratotype section and point gssp for the base of the holocene series epoch quaternary system period has been ratified by the international union of geological sciences five auxiliary stratotypes for the pleistocene holocene boundary have also been recognised copyright 2008 john wiley sons ltd

secondary circulations in the bottom boundary layer over sedimentary furrows secondary circulation is known to be an important feature of many atmospheric and laboratory boundary layers the presence of streamwise helical counterrotating vortices is documented here for the first time in the bottom boundary layer of a large natural body of water simultaneous vertical profiles of velocity and temperature were recorded on either side of a sedimentary furrow on the floor of lake superior depth 100 m in november 1985 flow roughness length zo was estimated to be 0 3 cm friction velocity u and turbulent boundary layer thickness lw were estimated for each profile allowing for stratification effects typically lw 10 m thermal stratification near the lake bed was an important constraint to boundary layer development bottom mixed layers were absent in most cases mean flow toward the furrow at lower levels within the boundary layer z lw 0 37 and mean flow away from the furrow at higher levels 0 37 z lw 1 65 were observed for near bottom speeds greater than 6 cm s when mean flow direction was within 25 of the furrow direction this implies helical vortex pair circulations with upward motion over the furrow consistent with earlier hypotheses cross stream secondary flows were typically 5 of the free stream primary flow speed streamwise vorticity in the range 1 5 m z 5 m was estimated to be 2 1 10 3 s 1

the initiation of sedimentary furrows by standing internal waves longitudinal helical vortices are generally considered to be the cause of longitudinal sedimentary bedforms in tidal oscillatory flows however it is not clear how a regular system of vortices will become fixed for long enough to establish the bedforms it is proposed that the presence of standing internal waves with axes parallel to the tidal current have provided the basic flow pattern on which longitudinal helical vortices develop in southampton water the observed furrows then developed in a pattern determined by the standing internal waves

dating human occupation and adaptation in the southern european last glacial refuge the chronostratigraphy of grotta del romito italy grotta del romito has been the subject of numerous archaeological chronological and palaeoenvironmental investigations for more than a decade during the upper palaeolithic period the site contains evidence of human occupation through the gravettian and epigravettian periods multiple human burials changes in the pattern of human occupation and faunal isotopic and sedimentological evidence for local environmental change in spite of this rich record the chronological control is insufficient to resolve shifts in subsistence and mobility patterns at sufficiently high resolution to match the abrupt climate fluctuations at this time to resolve this we present new radiocarbon and tephrostratigraphic dates in combination with existing radiocarbon dates and develop a bayesian age model framework for the site this improved chronology reveals that local environmental conditions reflect abrupt and long term changes in climate and that these also directly influence changing patterns of human occupation of the site in particular we show that the environmental record for the site based on small mammal habitat preferences is chronologically in phase with the main changes in climate and environment seen in key regional archives from italy and greenland we also calculate the timing of the transitions between different cultural phases and their spans we also show that the intensification in occupation of the site is chronologically coincident with a rapid rise in mesic woody taxa seen in key regional pollen records and is associated with the late epigravettian occupation of the site this change in the record of grotta del romito is also closely associated stratigraphically with a new tephra the rom d30 tephra which may act as a critical marker in environmental records of the region

sedimentary furrows and organized flow structure a study in lake superior investigations of the geology and physical limnology of a field of sedimentary furrows in lake superior have provided information on the characteristics of these bedforms and their relationship to the wind driven currents and associated turbulence structures in the bottom boundary layer the results generally support the existing conceptual model for furrow formation furrows in the study area 2 km2 at 100 m depth are spaced 20 l 00 m apart and exceed 800 m long the troughs being 0 5 m deep and 3 5 m wide sediment cores collected by submersible are poorly sorted cohesive terrigenous silts with a mean grain size of 20 pm relative to sediments in the interfurrow area those in the trough contain higher fractions of sand and coarse debris and accumulate at a rate 15 slower strong bottom currents speed 6 cm s l usually flow within 20 of the furrow direction and are most frequent between late october and early february when wind forced currents reach the bottom annual peak speeds approach 30 cm s l the relationship of the current and temperature records to the wind field is consistent with predictions of coastal jet theory profiling current meters deployed on either side of a furrow showed near bottom cross stream flow converging over the furrow with divergence higher in the boundary layer when the current speed exceeded 6 cm s l a preliminary numerical model exhibits a cross stream flow pattern consistent with the profiler observations

the de nadale cave zovencedo berici hills northeastern italy a small mammal fauna from near the onset of marine isotope stage 4 and its palaeoclimatic implications abstract marine isotope stage 4 mis 4 ca 71 57 ka is not well documented in european continental contexts and is characterized mainly by minimum summer insolation producing a maximum extension of the polar ice caps during the late pleistocene together with a lowering of the sea level in the northern hemisphere the de nadale cave site located at an altitude of 130 m a s l in the berici hills in northeastern italy contains a single archaeological layer unit 7 dated to mis 4 in this paper we present a palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimatic reconstruction based on small mammal insectivore bat and rodent assemblages from this layer habitat weighting and bioclimatic model methods were used in order to reconstruct the palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimatic conditions the results identify a cold climatic period with a landscape dominated by open woodland formations and open dry habitats dating to near the beginning of mis 4 the findings are consistent with studies of large mammals and previously reported pollen studies in terrestrial sequences of this age in italy and in cores from the offshore mediterranean basin given the scarcity of terrestrial data for mis 4 the de nadale cave constitutes an important site for our knowledge of the environment and climate of this period

a cave lion panthera spelaea skeleton from torca del leon nw iberia micromammals indicate a temperate and forest environment corresponding to gi 11 mis 3 abstract the torca del leon site asturias nw spain discovered in 2014 provided an interesting fossil assemblage including a p spelaea partial skeleton and a rich micro mammal community with palaeoenvironmental significance the bone accumulation was formed in a karstic cave that acted as a natural trap as indicated by the geomorphology of the cavity connected to a 16 m deep shaft and the lack of signs of human or carnivore activity on the bones the large mammal assemblage is composed of carnivores of which the most striking is the partial skeleton of the cave lion an exceptional find for this region which allowed a detailed comparative study its skull and teeth retained features of systematic relevance which agree with its ascription to p spelaea sexing of the specimen points to it possibly being from a male whose body weight was estimated at 360 kg other identified large mammals in the site include p pardus and canis lupus the rich small mammal assemblage comprising 14 taxa allowed inferring that the environment during site formation corresponded to a mature forest developed under humid and temperate conditions located at just 15 km from the glacial fronts of the cantabrian mountains ams dating yielded 43 0 0 5 cal ka bp coinciding with greenland interstadial gi 11 a warming event poorly known in nw iberia coeval with the onset of the regional glacial retreat occurred after the local glacial maximum of 45 ka this episode is also coeval with the middle to upper paleolithic transition in northwestern iberia

environmental change across the early middle pleistocene transition small mammalian evidence from the trinchera dolina cave atapuerca spain t he sites of atapuerca are well known for their hominin bearing localities of early to middle pleistocene age trinchera dolina yields western europe s oldest fossil hominin the 850 ka homo antecessor and at sima de los huesos there occurs the best collection of the middle pleistocene hominin homo heidelbergensis however small mammals rodentia insectivora chiroptera and lagomorpha represent the largest number of species and greatest fossil abundance in the deposits of the atapuerca cave complex the small mammals are grouped by habitat catego ries but because the ecology of mammals is complex we base our study on the evolution of these categories throughout the sequence the assemblage distribution at the trinchera dolina site reflects landscape and environmental changes during the past million years shifts between wood land open land and moorland are indicated by the relative abundance of species based on diagnos tic elements such as first lower molars these data are combined with the distribution of large mammals pollen sediments and geological context of the trinchera dolina site from this interdis ciplinary approach we conclude that the first hominins from western europe homo antecessor lived during a warm wet and wooded interval probably corresponding to marine isotope stages 21 to 19 the transition from early to middle pleistocene at atapuerca is characterized by palaeoenvi ronmental changes recorded between levels td5 6 and td8 10 respectively the general opening of the landscape at the beginning of the middle pleistocene could have favoured the dispersal of hominins homo heidelbergensis across western europe

side scan targets in lake superior evidence for bedforms and sediment transport a high resolution side scan sonar survey of the lake bed off the keweenaw peninsula lake superior demonstrates that bottom currents are affecting lake bed morphology at depths up to 240 m numerous lineations which run parallel to the shore appear to be sand ribbons a field of sedimentary furrows which occurs in one area demonstrates the long term directional stability of the near bottom flow large 100 300 m in diameter 2 5 m deep unusual ring like or arcuate depressions are common throughout the western half of lake superior these rings themselves do not appear to have been formed by bottom currents but may have developed as water was released by the rapid compaction of glacial sediments which underlie the lake bed off the keweenaw peninsula the forms of the rings have been modified by bottom currents the bottom currents which have modified the lake bed are probably generated when storms cross the lake at times when it is poorly stratified

small mammal diversity in spain during the late pleistocene to early holocene climate landscape and human impact we investigate changes in small mammal richness and diversity in southwestern europe iberian peninsula during the late pleistocene holocene transition in order to evaluate whether they follow a climatic pattern or are predominantly determined by human impact especially after the emergence of agriculture in the neolithic period we selected 6 late pleistocene and holocene sites that correspond to 18 different layers dated to between ca 22 and 3 kyr b p using indices of species richness and evenness diversity we show that climate played an important role at some sites during the late pleistocene and at the beginning of the holocene in that the richness and diversity of small mammals were closely related to the mean annual temperatures and landscape changes and varied according to the different climatic fluctuations detected heinrich event 1 bolling allerod and preboreal boreal however at the beginning of the mid holocene the small mammal richness and diversity no longer seem to follow any kind of climatic pattern and the observed changes in some studied sites are more closely related to human activities by contrast with similar studies carried out in other parts of the world the changes in diversity in the iberian peninsula do not seem to follow a constant pattern during the late pleistocene and beginning of the holocene some of the changes detected appear to be related to climate late pleistocene and others appear to be related to human influence holocene on the landscape

assessment of sedimentation processes determined from side scan sonar surveys in the buffalo river new york usa an assessment of sedimentation processes was made using side scan sonar records collected over a 15 year period in the buffalo river new york usa spatial and temporal changes in natural and man made bedforms documented sediment erosion slumping and sediment depositional sites bedforms and sediment texture were used to divide the mapped portion of the river 9 km into four sedimentary environments with section 1 at the upper end and section 4 near the mouth where the river discharges into the east end of lake erie based on annual changes in side scan sonar records depositional rates decrease in the downriver direction section 2 located 5 km from the river s mouth contains sedimentary furrows the persistence of furrows in this portion of the river requires both sediment erosion and deposition under a bidirectional flow regime results from this study confirmed that side scan sonar is a valuable tool in understanding sediment dynamics and can be useful in river restoration decision making

characteristics of pockmarks in the norwegian trench a 3 km wide corridor across the norwegian trench was surveyed in detail with high resolution side scan sonar and subbottom profiler boomer in order to study pockmarks the pockmarks in the norwegian trench are dish shaped depressions found in the soft silty clays they range from 2 m to 300 m in diameter and appear with a maximum density of 40 50 per km2 lineated depressions and strings of small pockmarks were discovered the strings are generally composed of individual pockmarks 10 15 m in diameter each string can be up to 400 m long some medium sized pockmarks 40 50 m in diameter were found in groups often associated with a large parental pockmark the deep towed subbottom profiler records indicated columnar disturbances fountains in the sediments below some of the pockmarks these fountains are interpreted as vents or fissures through which gas or liquids migrate buried pockmarks and anomalies interpreted as boulders possibly gas bubbles trapped in the substrata were also found the recordings bear evidence of gas or liquid migration originating from layers lying beneath the soft clay sequence a large hydrocarbon gas reservoir has recently been found during exploration drilling in the immediate vicinity of the studied pockmark area pockmarks may be indicators of deep lying gas or oil reservoirs and therefore prove interesting features in relation to hydrocarbon prospecting

mexican site for k t impact crater research throughout the caribbean suggests that the geophysical anomalies in the yucatan first noted by penfield and camargo 1981 and called the chicxulub crater could be the site of the impact purported to have caused the k t extinctions a semicircular ring of sink holes known locally as cenotes which correlates with the geophysical anomalies has been identified and it is argued that the origin of the cenote ring is related to postimpact subsidence of the chicxulub crater rim if there is indeed a crater the region within the cenote ring corresponds to its floor and the crater rim diameter is probably larger than 200 km if confirmed as a site of impact the chicxulub crater would be the largest terrestrial impact crater known which is consistent with the uniqueness of the k t global catastrophe

distribution morphology and origin of sedimentary furrows in cohesive sediments southampton water patches of sedimentary furrows are developed at several locations in the cohesive estuarine sediments of southampton water water depth 1 12 m these furrows apparently result from short periods of erosion followed by long periods of deposition although all the furrows are similar regularly spaced parallel troughs 0 5 15 m wide aligned with the dominant current furrows in different patches have different characteristics in some areas furrow width is 1 5 1 15 of furrow spacing termed narrow whereas in other areas furrow width is about 1 2 of the spacing termed wide narrow furrows have developed where sediment accumulation rates are greater than 3 6 cm yr 1 wide furrows where accumulation rates are lower cockle shells and other coarse sediments concentrated on the furrow floors and on floors of smaller 2 10 cm wide minifurrows play an important role in furrow formation and evolution as they act to widen the furrows when mobilized during current episodes uniform sedimentation across the profile during slack periods tends to narrow the furrow some of the larger furrows have remained in the same position for 12 years while mini furrows have duration scales of a few months or less well developed furrows are also found in a recently dredged channel bedforms similar to those described here may be preserved in the sedimentary record while no analogues to the larger furrows are presently known minifurrows may be morphologically similar to the gutter casts described from ancient rocks

stable isotope composition of late glacial land snail shells from grotta del romito southern italy palaeoclimatic implications abstract stable isotope composition of living and fossil land snail shells was determined at grotta del romito southern italy with the aim to reconstruct environmental and climatic variation in the area during late upper palaeolithic the investigated succession comprised 15 different excavated layers spanning between ca 13 000 and 14 500 yr cal bp the oxygen isotope composition of snail shells indicates a marked decrease at the layer d8 suggesting a climatic deterioration consistent with the gi 1d climatic event older dryas this climate deterioration may have been related to a substantial decrease of mean annual temperature with associated changes in the regional atmospheric circulation however the environmental conditions at the time of shell s growth in the other intervals sampled suggest condition comparable to the present day the carbon isotope composition of fossil snail shells is in agreement with other records which indicate a general increase of the 13 c values of organic matter during pleniglacial to late glacial caused by substantially lower atmospheric co 2 concentration at that time

classification of sedimentary furrows and a model for furrow initiation and evolution sedimentary furrows are longitudinal bed forms which form in fine grained cohesive sediments of the deep sea floor as well as in similar sediments in estuaries and in large lakes deep sea furrows have been observed where bottom currents often flow in one direction at 5 to 20 cm sec currents are much stronger greater than 50 cm sec in furrowed estuarine environments but sediment accumulation rates are higher a review of furrows studied in a variety of locations and environments suggests that these bed forms fall into two broad morphological classes those developed in muddy cohesive sediments tend to have steep walls and flat floors while those developed in carbonate rich cohesive sediments are broad and have gently sloping walls at abyssal depths furrows can often be detected by their distinctive echo patterns on 3 5 khz echo sounders a series of similar evenly spaced hyperbolic echoes which often have their apices tangent to the sea floor however different furrow cross sections may generate distinctive hyperbolic echo patterns a model for furrow initiation and development in muddy cohesive sediments suggests that furrows develop in depositional environments swept by recurring directionally stable and episodically strong currents furrows are initiated when secondary circulations in the boundary layer align coarse generally light debris in sand ribbon like bed forms as the coarse light sediments move along the sea floor they abrade small longitudinal troughs into the muds the grooves may fill in during intervals between strong current events if sedimentation rates are too high once a furrow is established on the sea floor further development may be controlled by the balance between sediment deposition and erosion where deposition occurs continuously and erosion occurs only episodically during brief periods of increased current strength narrow furrows width 1 5 to 1 15 of spacing appear to develop where deposition exceeds erosion whereas wide furrows width 1 2 of spacing develop where erosion exceeds or equals deposition dissolution may play an important role in the formation and evolution of furrows in carbonate rich cohesive sediments secondary circulation patterns over established furrows may be strongly controlled by bed form topography

detecting stratigraphical issues using direct radiocarbon dating from small mammal remains frequently preserved in archaeological and palaeontological sites the tiny size of small mammal remains favours percolations into underlying layers along stratigraphic sequences this is one of the various postdepositional processes that may affect the integrity of the original deposits and therefore the subsequent scientific interpretations recent developments in sample preparation offer the possibility of detecting intrusive episodes through the absolute dating of minute amounts of bone down to 10 mg meaning that isolated elements such as mandibles in this case are sufficient to obtain reliable radiocarbon dates if collagen is moderately to well preserved the radiocarbon dates obtained here for small mammal bones recovered from pre bolling to recent deposits and their comparison with previous dates obtained from other sources large mammal bones charcoal botanical samples etc with different protocols and instruments illustrate the potential of small mammal dating to reveal and eventually contribute a solution to stratigraphical issues in different archaeological contexts

the greenland ice core chronology 2005 15 42 ka part 2 comparison to other records a new greenland ice core chronology gicc05 based on multi parameter counting of annual layers has been obtained for the last 42 ka here we compare the glacial part of the new time scale which is based entirely on records from the northgrip ice core to existing time scales and reference horizons covering the same period these include the grip and northgrip modelled time scales the meese sowers gisp2 counted time scale the shackleton fairbanks grip time scale sfcp04 based on 14c calibration of a marine core the hulu cave record three volcanic reference horizons and the laschamp geomagnetic excursion event occurring around greenland interstadial 10 gicc05 is generally in good long term agreement with the existing greenland ice core chronologies and with the hulu cave record but on shorter time scales there are significant discrepancies around the last glacial maximum there is a more than 1 ka age difference between gicc05 and sfcp04 and a more than 0 5 ka discrepancy in the same direction between gicc05 and the age of a recently identified tephra layer in the northgrip ice core both sfcp04 and the tephra age are based on 14c dated marine cores and fixed marine reservoir ages for the laschamp event gicc05 agrees with a recent independent dating within the uncertainties

the palaeoecological meaning of macromammal remains from archaeological sites exemplified by the case study of grotta paglicci upper palaeolithic southern italy

submillennial environmental fluctuations during marine oxygen isotope stage 2 a comparative analysis of diatom and pollen evidence from lago grande di monticchio south italy high temporal resolution pollen and diatom analyses carried out on sediments from lago grande di monticchio span the interval 23 700 21 200 calendar yr bp a brief interstadial during marine oxygen isotope stage 2 both records exhibit marked changes that are interpreted as responses to climatic changes the diatoms and terrestrial vegetation appear to respond at the same time any relative lag in the response of the vegetation was less than the ca 60 yr resolution of the two records the interval coincides at least in part with the campo imperatore stade when the gran sasso ice sheet reached its maximum extent and water level was high in the fucino lake correlation of the marked environmental oscillation with one of the dansgaard oeschger events recorded by stable oxygen isotope records from the greenland ice cap is proposed this follows an interval interpreted as having a cold dry climate and correlated with a heinrich event in the north atlantic together the two records enable a multifactorial interpretation of the palaeoclimate changes that characterise the oscillation providing additional insight to that obtained from studies of ice and ocean sediment cores especially with respect to the seasonality of temperature and precipitation copyright 1999 john wiley sons ltd

palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimatic implications of the late quaternary sediment record of vico volcanic lake central italy a 15 m long sediment core recovered from the lago di vico caldera lake in central italy has been the subject of macrofacies description and sedimentological organic carbon content grain size and mineralogy investigation the results have been integrated with the pollen data from the same core in order to provide a regional climatic and environmental history with inferences on past lake levels and on moisture and temperature regimes radiometric 14c and 40ar 39ar dating biostratigraphical considerations and tephra analyses provide a chronological framework and indicate that the sequence spans the last 90 000 yr several moist periods have been identified that were characterised by enhanced weathering by hydrolysis of the catchment rocks these alternated with relatively dry phases associated with lowering of lake levels the lowest hydrolysis efficiency of the whole record accompanied by notable aeolian deposition was attained during the last glacial phase but moisture conditions were such that the lake level did not decrease probably owing to reduced temperatures evidence for cool climate also emerges for the early pleniglacial the highest available moisture was achieved within the holocene at 5 kyr bp the late holocene does not show either increase of aridity or degradation of the vegetation cover until at least roman times copyright 2001 john wiley sons ltd

the early middle pleistocene palaeoenvironmental change based on the squamate reptile and amphibian proxies at the gran dolina site atapuerca spain abstract although still ongoing the archaeological and palaeontological excavations in the gran dolina cave sierra de atapuerca burgos every year since 1976 have already revealed a long culturally and palaeontologically rich sequence dated by biostratigraphy esr u series and the palaeomagnetic record at between roughly 1 my and 250 ky gran dolina has one of the longest and most continuous vertical profiles the section 19 m thick divided into 11 stratigraphic levels represents a time span of nearly 700 000 years the gran dolina sequence was partially excavated during a preliminary evaluation of its archaeological and palaeontological richness this excavation known as the gran dolina sondeo south lasted from 1993 to 1999 hominin remains were unearthed in 1994 from level 6 of gran dolina and level 6 was dated to somewhat more than 780 ky based on palaeomagnetic and microfaunal evidence making these the oldest known hominins in europe given the importance of this discovery every effort is being made to reconstruct the landscapes where these hominins once thrived the gran dolina sondeo south tds has furnished a great number of microvertebrate remains and of these around 40 000 bones are attributed to amphibians and squamates the faunal list of the squamates and amphibians of the tds comprises at least 22 species a diversity similar to what exists nowadays in spain triturus sp alytes obstetricans pelobates cultripes pelodytes punctatus bufo bufo bufo calamita hyla arborea rana temporaria rana cf dalmatina rana cf iberica pelophylax ridibunda sp blanus cinereus lacerta s l small sized indeterminate lacertids anguis fragilis natrix natrix natrix maura coronella austriaca coronella cf girondica rhinechis scalaris vipera cf aspis and vipera cf latasti these ectotherm vertebrates show variations in their taxonomic diversity throughout the sequence although they do not differ specifically from the extant herpetofauna of the iberian peninsula they do so in the composition of their taxonomic assemblage when the squamates and amphibians of tds are grouped by habitat categories the habitat weightings method and studied in terms of their vertical evolution throughout the sequence it is possible to follow environmental changes across the early middle pleistocene transition results from the squamate and amphibian studies indicate that the landscape had open habitats in the vicinity of the atapuerca caves throughout the sequence with wet points in the surrounding area open dry microhabitats were more developed during warm periods whereas during cold periods the environment was slightly more humid and wooded these results are compared with studies in small mammals pollen analysis and geomorphology giving a scenario for the palaeoclimatic and palaeoenvironmental changes that occurred during the early to middle pleistocene boundary in atapuerca and hence a scenario for the hominins that once lived in the sierra de atapuerca

reconstruction of the neanderthal and modern human landscape and climate from the fumane cave sequence verona italy using small mammal assemblages abstract fumane cave located at an altitude of 350 m a s l in the monti lessini in the veneto pre alps northeastern italy is a reference site for southern europe for the study of the behaviour of neanderthals and anatomically modern humans amh from marine isotope stages 5 to 2 mis5 mis2 it is one of the few well dated and closely studied sites in the italian peninsula with a finely layered sedimentary sequence from the mousterian to gravettian in this paper we present for the first time a palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimatic reconstruction of the mis3 and mis2 sequence based on the small mammal insectivore bat and rodent assemblages the environmental and climatic results coupled with the radiocarbon dating together with previous studies on large mammals birds and charcoal and other studies on small mammals and pollen for the same time span in italy enable us clearly to identify distinct climatic periods within our data heinrich event 5 in units a7 to a6 greenland interstadial 12 in units a5 a6 to a4 heinrich event 4 in units a3 to a1 and heinrich event 3 in unit d1e finally the study shows that neanderthals and anatomically modern humans were well adapted to the different climatic and environmental conditions of mis3 at the foot of the alps

environmental and climatic reconstruction of mis 3 in northwestern europe using the small mammal assemblage from caverne marie jeanne hastiere lavaux belgium abstract marine isotope stage 3 mis 3 ca 60 30 ka is characterized by dynamic alternations of forest expansion with semi arid area expansion in accordance with the warming and cooling respectively of the sea surface temperatures in northern europe it was in this context of rapid fluctuations that the terrestrial sequence of caverne marie jeanne hastiere lavaux belgium in northwestern europe was formed the habitat weighting method and the bioclimatic model as well as the simpson diversity index are applied to the small mammal assemblage of caverne marie jeanne in order to reconstruct the environmental and climatic fluctuations that are reflected in the mis 3 sequence of the cave revision of the small mammal fossil material deposited in the collections of the royal belgian institute of natural sciences rbins brussels belgium shows that the lower layers 6 to 4 of the cave pertaining to mis 3 ca 50 40 ka underwent cold dry environmental and climatic conditions for these layers this is indicated by temperatures lower than at present and precipitation slightly higher than at present together with an environment dominated by open woodland formations and open dry meadows our results are consistent with the available chronological large mammal herpetofaunal and mollusc datasets for this lower part of the sequence they are also consistent with regional loess studies in belgium and with previous work performed on small mammals from mis 3 in belgium and elsewhere in europe

palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimatic reconstruction of the latest pleistocene of el portalon site sierra de atapuerca northwestern spain the site of el portalon is the entrance to the cueva mayor karst system located in the sierra de atapuerca burgos spain this is an important holocene archaeological site which was excavated in the 1970s but from which little has been published new excavations starting in 2000 have highlighted a deep stratigraphical sequence with human occupations starting at the end of the late pleistocene in this paper we present for the first time on the basis of the small vertebrate assemblage palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimatic reconstructions of the latest pleistocene of the sierra de atapuerca well known for its early to middle pleistocene human bearing localities the small vertebrates of el portalon comprise at least 25 species 4 amphibians alytes obstetricans bufo bufo bufo calamita and rana temporaria 3 squamates an indeterminate small size lacertid an indeterminate large colubrine and vipera sp 6 insectivores sorex gr coronatus araneus sorex minutus neomys fodiens neomys anomalus talpa europaea and galemys pyrenaicus 2 bats myotis myotis and myotis gr myotis blythi 10 rodents microtus arvalis microtus agrestis microtus oeconomus iberomys cabrerae chionomys nivalis terricola duodecimcostatus arvicola sapidus arvicola terrestris apodemus sylvaticus and eliomys quercinus these taxa many of which are ecothermal sensitive to temperature show variations in their taxonomic diversity throughout the sequence although with the exception of m oeconomus they do not differ from the extant fauna of the iberian peninsula they do so in the abundance of their taxonomic assemblage when the small vertebrates are grouped and studied in terms of vertical trends through the sequence it is possible to follow environmental and climatic changes results from the small vertebrate associations indicate that the landscape had open habitats in the vicinity of the atapuerca caves throughout the sequence with wet locales in the surrounding area woodland and water stream meadows were more developed during warm periods is5 is6 is7 and is3 is4 whereas during cold periods h3 and lgm the environment was slightly more humid in response to winter precipitation and the opening of the landscape these results are compared with pollen analysis and marine isotopic curves giving a scenario for the palaeoclimatic and palaeoenvironmental changes that occurred during the latest pleistocene in the sierra de atapuerca

the return to the iberian peninsula first quaternary record of muscardinus and a palaeogeographical overview of the genus in europe abstract although the earliest record of the genus muscardinus dates from the middle miocene in spain no mention has been reported since the lower pliocene in the iberian peninsula in this paper quaternary fossil remains of a hazel dormouse muscardinus avellanarius are described for the first time in the iberian peninsula these remains constitute the south westernmost record of the genus in the eurasian continent during the late pleistocene the fossils one first upper molar m1 and two second upper molars m2 come from lezetxiki ii cave an early late pleistocene site in northern spain the presence of the hazel dormouse agrees with the abundance of rodent species indicative of woodland suggesting mild climatic conditions and a landscape formed by deciduous forest this assemblage has been arguably assigned to warm and humid conditions related to an interstadial period in mis 5 we also present an overview of the palaeogeography of the genus in europe the identification of this dormouse reinforces the idea of biological corridors between western iberia and the rest of europe during the pleistocene

effects of bottom currents and fish on sedimentation in a deep water lacustrine environment sands and muds accumulating under the influence of apparently strong bottom currents in a deep water environment of lake superior were studied in detail using 3 5 khz echo sounding side scan sonar piston gravity and box coring and lake floor photography the study area includes a well defined slope and basin environment bottom currents maintain a scoured trough 20 m deep and 2 km wide at the base of the slope and modify the shapes of large ringlike depressions that are common in many regions of lake superior side scan sonar records reveal lineations subparallel to the direction of bottom current flow that are interpreted in different areas to be sand ribbons slight depressions or depositional furrows the sediments range from silty sand in the scoured trough to sandy clays farther offshore radiocarbon dating and 210 pb dating show the sediments to be postglacial rather than relic glacial lacustrine sediments grain size distributions are affected by bottom currents and a nearby source of sand some sedimentary structures including plane laminations and interbedded sands and muds are due to bottom currents fish create dish laminations however that often obscure the effects of the bottom currents fish and fish scour depressions are common in lake floor photographs whereas evidence for bottom currents is not biological activity therefore appears to erase traces of intermittent currents

the fossil mammal fauna from the upper depositional unit of the logovo gyieny hyena s den cave northwestern altai russia abstract the paper presents a study of the fossil microfauna from the logovo gieny cave northwestern altai russia the microfauna with 30 identified species comes from six layers of the upper unit of the cave s central hall that was excavated in summer 2008 selected for the morphotype analyses three species alticola strelzowi lasiopodomys stenocranius gregalis and microtus oeconomus showed that their parameters layer 6 2 correspond with those found in the late pleistocene site of altai region new data did not demonstrate any abrupt successions of the mammal communities and contained similar species in all the layers indicative of the steppe environments however the faunal assemblages revealed different climatic conditions which combined with previously known radiocarbon dates were aligned with the gs3 mis 2 and gs 6 7 mis 3 phases of the greenland ice core records

the mutual climatic range technique is usually not the area of sympatry technique when reconstructing paleoenvironments based on faunal remains abstract names applied to particular analytical techniques must be explicit and distinctive the potential that two distinct techniques of paleoenvironmental reconstruction that use ancient faunal remains each with a particular name might be confused in the future has recently become a reality the name mutual climatic range mcr coined and developed in the 1980s and concerning the modern climatic not geographic co occurrence of species represented in a prehistoric collection of remains has been applied multiple times to a different technique first published in 2009 the new mcr technique is very similar to a distinct one developed in the 1950s and 1960s that focuses on the location of the geographic co occurrence of species in an assemblage relative to the location of the deposit producing the remains the older method has been known as the area of sympatry aos technique since 1966 histories of the aos and original mcr techniques suggest they were developed independently the new mcr technique seems to have been developed without knowledge of the two earlier ones to avoid future confusion of one technique with the other it is suggested that the new one be renamed the utm mcr technique because rather than use isopleths of climatic variables as the aos technique does it considers climatic variables within 10 10 km utm squares

the role of non uniform roughness in the formation of sand ribbons abstract sand ribbons typically are shallow water sedimentary features characterized as thin elongate bands of sand overlying a coarser lag sediment which is exposed between them the ribbons are oriented along the direction of the dominant current and are formed by a secondary circulation pattern that includes a small component of the boundary shear stress directed toward the center of the sand ribbons a perturbation expansion coupled with flume experiments indicates that this circulation pattern is linked to differences in the bottom roughness between the sand ribbons and the adjacent coarser strips the non uniform turbulence field arising from this roughness distribution drives a secondary helical flow the expansion indicates that there is a preferred ratio of sand ribbon spacing to water depth 4 1 for unstratified channel flow conditions the secondary flow pattern forces the downstream flow to readjust so that the boundary shear stress over the smooth sand strips is considerably smaller than the mean stress this serves to retard the movement of sand through such a system

paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic context during the upper palaeolithic late upper pleistocene in the italian peninsula the small mammal record from grotta paglicci rignano garganico foggia southern italy abstract changes in large mammal population and biotic regionalism of the italian peninsula during upper pleistocene have been well documented over the last twenty years on the other hand only few studies have focused on the changes in small mammal fossil assemblages grotta paglicci is a key archaeological site for italian prehistory it is well dated and it shows an uninterrupted chronological sequence of upper palaeolithic lithic industries ranging from the aurignacian to the late epigravettian small mammal remains from the upper palaeolithic layers of this cave have been identified and the assemblage has been analysed through the application of simpson diversity index habitat weighting and bioclimatic model methods the results show remarkable differences through the record major climatic changes gs2 is particularly well defined are visible and a clear turning point is observable at the bolling allerod interstadial transition this is in line with environmental and climatic oscillations already detected in the italian peninsula these data also suggest that a strong regionalism characterized the south eastern italian peninsula during the late pleistocene