Search results for ""Author Jörgen Runge""

Founded in 1966, the internationally recognized and acclaimed Series ‘Palaeoecology of Africa’ publishes interdisciplinary scientific papers on landscape evolution and on former environments of the African continent. Beginning with topics such as changes in climate and vegetation cover, the papers expand horizons and interconnections to various types of environmental dynamics from the Cainozoic up to the present; moreover, the aspect of human influence since the Late Quaternary is related to many of the areas studied.Volume 31 presents four comprehensive papers on long- and short-term processes of landscape evolution (geological history, neotectonics and proxy Quaternary alluvia), as well as a recent regional perspective on environmental problems in Southern Cameroon. The book acts as a showcase for successful North-South cooperation and capacity building for empowering African Universities. It is problem oriented and applied, and illustrates how scientific and interdisciplinary cooperation can work. In the framework of the German Research Foundation’s (DFG, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) funded "Rain Forest Savanna Contact" project (2003-2009) two abbreviated English versions of PhD theses are here published, one by J. Eisenberg on neotectonics and the other by M. Sangen on river sediments in rain forest-savanna transitional zones. Complementary articles are an introduction on geological history, by B. Kankeu et al. and a paper on environmental risks by M. Tchindjang et al., together these complete the results of this joint German-Cameroonian research project.This book will be of interest to all concerned with ecosystems dynamics, tropical forests, savannas and related development problems of Third World countries, especially regional planners, ecologists, botanists, earth scientists and students of the Quaternary (e.g. LGM and Holocene ecosystem dynamics, Global Change). It will be valuable for advanced undergraduates and postgraduates as a reference for new research articles on the topic of long‐term geologic‐tectonic and Quaternary landscape evolution in an up‐to‐now not well explored marginal area of the Western Congo basin.

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Volume 32 (2013) of the internationally recognized and acclaimed yearbook series ‘Palaeoecology of Africa’ publishes 9 new interdisciplinary scientific papers on former and recent landscape evolution and on past environments of the African continent (e.g. climate change, vegetation dynamics and growing impact of humans on ecosystems). These papers expand horizons and interconnections to various types and methodologies of research on environmental dynamics from the Pliocene up to the present: review articles and regional case studies cover Nigeria, Cameroon, selected areas of the Congo basin, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia and South Africa. This volume also gives space to researchers from Africa to present their findings to a wider international audience.Today, by growing awareness of the worldwide impact of Global Change, it has become obvious that aside of the northern and southern hemisphere Polar region also the environmental setting in Africa was subject to considerable changes over time. Natural shifts in climate at least since the Pliocene have caused repeated and strong modification in the area dynamics of ecosystems located in lower latitudes. By a variety of so-called ‘proxies’ – researched and applied by the different authors from numerous disciplines – an attempt is made to reconstruct the evolution of landscapes over space and time. Besides such spatio-temporal oscillations in forested and savanna areas of Africa this volume of ‘Palaeoecology of Africa’ also focuses on possible relationships between environmental change and human impact, also on the perception of this phenomenon of recent ‘climate changes’ by different stakeholders.This book will be of interest to all concerned with low latitudes ecosystem changes and their respective interpretation in the framework of natural climate and vegetation change evidenced by a variety of methods that allow us to read and learn from ‘proxy data’ archives. Archaeologists, Palynologists, Palaeobotanist, Geographers, Geologists and Geomorphologists will find this edition equally useful for their work.

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The environmental setting within the Central Sahara was subject to considerable changes during Late Quaternary, mainly driven by major global climate variations, although human impact increased constantly since Early Holocene.Such global events can be reconstructed with the help of reliefs, sediments and palaeosoils and their specific morphological, chemical and mineralogical properties. The project’s focus is to ascertain new and established data on climate variations and associated palaeoenvironmental changes within the Central Sahara and to systematically collate and correlate them to results obtained from the Afro-Asian dry land belt and adjacent areas. The joint analysis of Late Quaternary landscape development and present environmental conditions in the Central Sahara will result in the modelling of Late Pleistocene and Holocene palaeoenvironments, emphasising various aspects. This book will be of interest to all concerned with environmental changes in desert ecosystems in the past and at present and related development problems of Saharan countries, especially Ecologists, Botanists, Earth scientists and Climatologists. It will be valuable for advanced undergraduates and postgraduates as a reference for review and overview articles as well as a source of information for new original manuscripts on the topic of Late Pleistocene and Holocene landscape evolution in the lower latitudes of Africa. Palaeobotanists, Palynologists, Geomorphologists and Quaternarists will equally find this edition useful for their work.

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