US-Africa Planning Visit: Geolimnology Research on Lake Tanganyika

约翰森0434609这项计划访问奖将使国际和平协会能够于2004年7月与赞比亚和比利时的科学家以及坦桑尼亚的考察船操作员会面，规划东非坦噶尼喀湖的合作实地考察工作。这个湖记录了热带气候历史，在信号强度、时间分辨率、连续性和持续时间方面都是无与伦比的。不幸的是，还没有研究将热带气候动态与沉积到湖底的沉积物成分严格联系起来。PI设想在坦噶尼喀湖南部开展一个国际合作实地项目，通过水柱捕捉每月的沉积物降雨，并将其与当地气候和湖泊过程联系起来。将组建一个由来自美国、非洲和欧洲的合作者组成的科学团队，并将制定一项详细的研究计划。将于2004年秋季为NSF和欧洲和非洲的适当资金来源提出建议，要求从2005年开始为实际开展的科学活动提供资金。计划中的研究的更广泛影响将包括在国际环境中培训美国本科生和研究生，他们将参与实地考察、实验室分析和数据解释。国际和平研究所的古气候研究对更好地了解非洲大陆的气候动态做出了重大贡献，该大陆经历了比地球上其他任何地方都多的干旱和洪水造成的人类死亡。

Johnson0434609This planning visit award will enable the PI to meet in July 2004 with scientists in Zambia and Belgium, and with research vessel operators in Tanzania, to plan for collaborative fieldwork on Lake Tanganyika, East Africa. This lake hold records of tropical climate history that are unparalleled in their signal strength, temporal resolution, continuity and duration. Unfortunately no investigations have rigorously linked tropical climate dynamics with composition of sediments that settle to the lake floor. The PI envisions an international collaborative field program in southern Lake Tanganyika, capturing the monthly rain of sediment through the water column and linking it to local climate and lake processes. A scientific team of collaborators from the U.S., Africa and Europe will be assembled and a detailed research plan will be formulated. Proposals will be developed for NSF and for appropriate funding sources in Europe and Africa in Fall 2004, requesting funds for the actual science to be undertaken, beginning in 2005.The broader impact of the planned research will involve the training of U.S. undergraduate and graduate students in an international setting in which they will participate in the fieldwork, laboratory analyses, and interpretation of data. The PI's paleoclimate research contributes significantly to the better understanding of climate dynamics over the continent that experiences more human fatalities due to droughts and floods than anywhere else on Earth.