Interglacial climate variability

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The aim of this project is to reconstruct the palaeoclimatological changes in the Dead Sea Basin and adjacent areas during the last two interglacials as archived in the ICDP Dead Sea Deep Drilling Project (DSDDP) sediment cores, using a unique combination of high-resolution sedimentological-mineralogical, geochemical and rock magnetic studies. A detailed comparison of the Holocene and Eemian sediment formations will be crucial for the understanding of interglacial climate variability in the central and eastern Mediterranean. Within this project we will also provide the first sedimentary record of the Younger Dryas and the MIS 5/6 transition in the Dead Sea Basin, these time intervals are preserved in none of the outcrops due to depositional hiatus. A second focus of the rock magnetic investigations will be on the genesis of the Fe-sulfide greigite, since greigite formation is strongly enhanced during wet climatic phases. A novel methodological approach for identifying flood and dust storm layers in Dead Sea sediments developed on existing core material from the western shore of the Dead Sea will also be applied, thus enhancing the Holocene time series of these event deposits.