Tephra connections between environmental change and human prehistory in Ethiopia

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Pleistocene volcanism associated with the MER produced colossal pyroclastic deposits found widely as tephra layerswithin sedimentary archives such as lake sediments and fluvial terraces. Due to the prevalence of tephra inarchaeological sequences, their correlation and dating has become fundamental to the chronology of the hominin recordin Ethiopia (and in eastern Africa more generally). However, the record of past MER volcanism is far from complete andrecent work combining volcanic outcrop, archaeological, fluvial and lake sediment sequences, has shown that manycorrelations require testing with new samples and state-of-the-art analytical protocols. In addition, there is nowdemonstrated potential to use cryptotephra methods to fill critical gaps in the volcanological record and increase thedetection and correlation of tephra isochrons within sedimentary sequences.