The evolution of Late Quaternary alluvial landscapes in northern Oman

阿曼北部晚第四纪冲积地貌的演化

• 批准号: 2067162
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Oxford
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2018 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2067162
• 关键词: evolution; Late; Quaternary; alluvial; landscapes

Rapid urban and industrial development is altering the landscape of Arabia at an alarming rate. However, these landscapes are archives of hundreds of thousands of years of environmental change, and provide an important framework for understanding the demographic variability of human populations in the distant past. Multi-proxy data from an extensive suite of river and lake deposits along the western Hajar Mountains can be used to develop a sensitive record of climatically-driven environmental change. The dispersals of prehistoric populations are fundamentally linked to the availability of freshwater resources within the Arabian Peninsula. In particular, the occupation of archaeological sites such as Jebel Faya (UAE), are seemingly synchronous with increased rainfall and the expansion of vegetation throughout the region. Despite the potential of palaeoenvironmental investigations in this region to advance knowledge of early human-environment interactions, to date there are only a few studies with good chronometric control. Therefore, building an advanced and securely dated framework of Arabian palaeohydrology from fan systems within the region has the potential to generate a high-resolution record of the water resources available to our ancestors, and the environmental pressures influencing their mobility. This record has huge educational value for regional museums and heritage organisations.Research questions: The main aim of this project is to develop a framework of climatically driven landscape change from SE Arabia utilising a series of dated fluvial/alluvial sediment sequences situated along the western Hajar Mountains. The overarching research questions will be: 1. What is the nature and timing of drainage activation from the western Hajar region of SE Arabia? 2. How did the abiotic and biotic components of SE Arabian environments respond to these periods of drainage activation? 3. How do such changes correspond with wider regional and global climate variability? 4. What implications did these changes in water resource availability have for Early Homo sapiens and their demography throughout the Mid-Late Pleistocene? 5. How can these findings be used to improve presentation of the stories of pre-historic peoples in museums and heritage sites within the region?

快速的城市和工业发展正以惊人的速度改变着阿拉伯的面貌。然而，这些景观是数十万年环境变化的档案，为理解遥远过去人类人口的人口变化提供了一个重要的框架。来自哈贾尔山脉西部大量河流和湖泊沉积物的多代理数据可用于开发气候驱动的环境变化的敏感记录。史前种群的分散与阿拉伯半岛内淡水资源的供应有根本的联系。特别是，像Jebel Faya（阿联酋）这样的考古遗址的占领，似乎与整个地区降雨量的增加和植被的扩大同时发生。尽管该地区的古环境调查有可能促进对早期人类与环境相互作用的认识，但迄今为止，只有少数研究具有良好的时间控制。因此，从该地区的扇系统中建立一个先进的、可靠的阿拉伯古水文框架，有可能产生我们祖先可用的水资源的高分辨率记录，以及影响他们流动性的环境压力。这一记录对地区博物馆和文物组织具有巨大的教育价值。研究问题：该项目的主要目的是利用位于哈贾尔山脉西部的一系列河流/冲积沉积物序列，开发一个气候驱动的阿拉伯东南部景观变化框架。首要的研究问题将是：1。阿拉伯半岛东部哈贾尔地区西部的排水活化的性质和时间是什么？2. 阿拉伯东南部环境的非生物和生物组分如何响应这些排水激活时期？3. 这些变化如何与更广泛的区域和全球气候变率相对应？4. 这些水资源可用性的变化对早期智人及其在中晚更新世的人口统计有什么影响？5. 如何利用这些发现来改善该地区博物馆和遗产遗址中史前民族故事的呈现？