Understanding Quaternary variations in water availability in the Near East as a key for future projections of regional environmental change

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The Quatemary environmental and dimatic conditions in the Near East are of academic interest, and also significant for its present-day socioeconomic development. Late Pleistocene and Holocene records will be investigated to improve the knowledge with respect to the range of the environmental and dimatic fluctuations in the Near East. Environmental and climatic conditions especially during the warmer periods of the Quaternary may be regarded as potential analogies for future climate change in a region which already faces enormous problems in water supply and sustainable use of water resources. Existing and newly developed tools for quantitative palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimate reconstructions will be applied based on modern calibration data sets and multivariate statistical analysis. In addition, archaeological excavation sites of early, middle and late Pleistocene age will be investigated in the Jordan Valley which served as a migration corridor during the spread of hominins Out of Africa. The large number of archaeological finds from excavations is in clear contrast to the rare information available thus far with respect to the overall environmental setting and the climate conditions during the migration waves and the emergence of modern people. New information concerning the natural background during these periods will be provided as a result of the proposed research.