Paleoenvironmental and climate reconstructions in the winter rainfall zone (WRZ) of South Africa using integrated investigations of lacustrine and marine archives ('CAUSAL')

最近的全球气候变化影响了世界上许多半干旱和干旱地区，例如南部非洲的水资源供应。为了准确预测未来区域水收支和气候的变化，确定过去环境和气候动态的驱动力及其时空变化是至关重要的。计划中的研究项目将有助于了解南非冬季降雨区的全新世环境和气候变化。在所要求的项目中，将使用多代理方法以高分辨率重建过去的古环境、古气候和海平面变化。这是基于对沿海Verlorenvlei湖已有的13.65米长的湖泊沉积岩芯进行的地球化学、矿物学和生物地球化学分析，该湖芯覆盖了过去9000卡BP。项目伙伴将通过对位于Verlorenvlei附近海岸附近的海洋沉积物岩心的调查提供类似的数据。对这两份档案的比较将揭开从陆地到海洋运输过程中的代理变化，并有助于获取真实的气候信号。除了自然气候的可变性，对湖泊沉积物的调查被认为揭示了人类对环境影响的新信息。在南非的另外两个雨带(常年雨带和夏季雨带)，由德国教育和研究部(BMBF)资助的所谓RAIN项目的合作伙伴提供了对陆地和海洋档案的类似调查，该项目的目的是调查南部非洲的陆地和海洋沉积档案，这里提议的项目将与该项目有关。这将能够重建南非三个不同降雨区内全新世环境动态的发展。确定区域环境变化驱动因素的时空变化也将有助于理解全球气候动态。

Recent global climate change affects the availability of water in many semi-arid and arid regions of the world such as for example southern Africa. In order to precisely predict future variations of the regional water budget and climate, the identification of driving forces of environmental and climate dynamics during the past as well as their spatio-temporal variations are essential. The intended research project will contribute to the understanding of Holocene environmental and climate variations in the winter rainfall zone of South Africa. Within the requested project paleoenvironmental, paleoclimatic, and sea level changes during the past will be reconstructed in high-resolution using a multi-proxy approach. This is based on geochemical, mineralogical and bio-geochemical analyses on an already existing 13.65 m long lacustrine sediment core from the coastal lake Verlorenvlei covering the past 9,000 cal BP. Similar data will be provided by project partners from investigations of a marine sediment core located off the coast near Verlorenvlei. Comparison of both archives will unravel proxy alterations during transport from land to sea and help to acquire a true climatic signal. Besides natural climate variability, investigations on the lacustrine sediments are assumed to reveal new information on human impact on the environment. From the other two rainfall zones of South Africa (year-round- and summer rainfall zone) similar investigations of paired terrestrial and marine archives are provided by partners from the so-called RAIN project which is funded by the German Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) aiming to investigate terrestrial and marine sedimentary archives in southern Africa and to which the here proposed project will be associated to. This will enable a reconstruction of the development of Holocene environmental dynamics within the three different rainfall zones of South Africa. The identification of the spatio-temporal variations of the drivers for regional environmental change will also contribute to the understanding of global climatic dynamics.