Pressurised meltwater has a major impact on ice dynamics, as well as on sedimentary and deformational processes occurring below/in front of glaciers and ice sheets, but its role in glaciotectonic processes is yet to be fully understood. This study explores micro- and macroscale structures developed within décollements in two thrust-block moraines of Late Weichselian age in Melasveit, western Iceland. The aim is to investigate how pressurised subglacial meltwater can aid the dislocation and transport of large, unfrozen and unlithified sediment blocks by glaciers. A detailed model is constructed for the development of the thrust-block moraines and the microscale processes occurring along their detachments during thrusting. The detachments are characterized by relatively thin zones of crosscutting hydrofractures, which reflect fluctuating water pressures during glaciotectonism. Little evidence of shearing is observed along the leading edges of the thrusts in both moraines. This is supported by high water pressures along the detachments and indicates that the thrust blocks were initially decoupled from the underlying deposits. As the thrust moraines evolved, an increased amount of shear occurred in between events of sediment liquefaction, hydrofracturing, and fluid escape. This was followed by progressive locking up of the detachments and eventual cessation in the accretion of the thrust blocks.

Central Asia is highly vulnerable to large earthquakes, yet existing records of past seismic activity in this area are still insufficient to reliably assess regional earthquake hazard on longer timescales. Within this study, the sediments of Sary Chelek, a mountain lake in the western Kyrgyz Tian Shan, were investigated to explore its potential as a natural paleoseismic archive. The lacustrine deposits are characterized by a succession of annually laminated (varved) sediments overlying event deposits that consist of large-scale turbidites and distorted lake sediments, similar to earthquake-related deposits described from other lake sediment records. Microscopic sediment analysis furthermore revealed distorted varves in the laminated sequence that closely resemble earthquake-related soft-sediment deformation structures. Varve counting and radiometric dating determine the formation of the distorted varves and the emplacement of the large-scale event deposits to the early 1990s and mid-1940s, respectively. This is in good temporal agreement with the occurrence of two large earthquakes that struck western Kyrgyzstan in AD 1992 and AD 1946. These results and particularly the precise age control of the Sary Chelek sediment record highlight its potential for establishing a long and precisely dated record of regional earthquake activity.

We propose the concept of the “Fish Revolution” to demarcate the dramatic increase in North Atlantic fisheries after AD 1500, which led to a 15-fold increase of cod (Gadus morhua) catch volumes and likely a tripling of fish protein to the European market. We consider three key questions: (1) What were the environmental parameters of the Fish Revolution? (2) What were the globalising effects of the Fish Revolution? (3) What were the consequences of the Fish Revolution for fishing communities? While these questions would have been considered unknowable a decade or two ago, methodological developments in marine environmental history and historical ecology have moved information about both supply and demand into the realm of the discernible. Although much research remains to be done, we conclude that this was a major event in the history of resource extraction from the sea, mediated by forces of climate change and globalisation, and is likely to provide a fruitful agenda for future multidisciplinary research.

We use biochemical, biological, archaeological, and historical analysis to examine relationships between Atlantic cod migration, sea temperature, and shifts in the distribution and occupancy of historical fishing sites in Iceland during the last millennium. Results support the hypothesis that the cooling climate of the North Atlantic during the period commonly referred to as the Little Ice Age coincided with changes in Atlantic cod migration patterns. Historical analysis shows a concomitant increase in reports of worsening Atlantic cod fishing and a severe decrease in domestic fishing, particularly in north Iceland. We conclude that Atlantic cod fisheries in Iceland originally thrived because of the proximity to cod migration routes. However, despite the mobility of local fishers, fluctuations in fish migrations, coupled with a harsher climate and increased competition for fishing grounds, resulted in a stagnation that lasted until the eventual modernization of the fishery in the mid-nineteenth century.

A novel quantitative assessment of late Holocene precipitation in the Levant is presented, including mean and variance of annual precipitation and their trends. A stochastic framework was utilized and allowed, possibly for the first time, linking high-quality, reconstructed rises/declines in Dead Sea levels with precipitation trends in its watershed. We determined the change in mean annual precipitation for 12 specific intervals over the past 4500 yr, concluding that: (1) the twentieth century was substantially wetter than most of the late Holocene; (2) a representative reference value of mean annual precipitation is 75% of the present-day parameter; (3) during the late Holocene, mean annual precipitation ranged between −17 and +66% of the reference value (−37 to +25% of present-day conditions); (4) the driest intervals were 1500–1200 BC and AD 755–890, and the wettest intervals were 2500–2460 BC, 130–40 BC, AD 350–490, and AD 1770–1940; (5) lake-level rises and declines probably occurred in response to trends in precipitation means and are less likely to occur when precipitation mean is constant; (6) average trends in mean annual precipitation during intervals of ≥200 yr did not exceed 15 mm per decade. The precipitation trends probably reflect shifts in eastern Mediterranean cyclone tracks.

Various paleoclimatic records have been used to reconstruct the hydrologic history of the Altiplano, relating this history to past variability of the South American summer monsoon. Prior studies of the southern Altiplano, the location of the world’s largest salt flat, the Salar de Uyuni, and its neighbor, the Salar de Coipasa, generally agree in their reconstructions of the climate history of the past ∼24 ka. Some studies, however, have highly divergent climatic records and interpretations of earlier periods. In this study, lake-level variation was reconstructed from a ∼14-m-long sediment core from the Salar de Coipasa. These sediments span the last ∼40 ka. Lacustrine sediment accumulation was apparently continuous in the basin from ∼40 to 6 ka, with dry or very shallow conditions afterward. The fossil diatom stratigraphy and geochemical data (δ13C, δ15N, %Ca, C/N) indicate fluctuations in lake level from shallow to moderately deep, with the deepest conditions correlative with the Heinrich-1 and Younger Dryas events. The stratigraphy shows a continuous lake of variable depth and salinity during the last glacial maximum and latter stages of Marine Oxygen Isotope Stage 3 and is consistent with environmental inferences and the original chronology of a drill core from Salar de Uyuni.

The Ebro catchment includes a continental foreland basin that underwent an endorheic–exorheic transition. Morphometric studies, including hypsometric curves, hypsometric integrals, asymmetry factor, mountain front sinuosity, normalised stream-length gradient, and normalised concavity indices for the Ebro River and 32 of its tributaries, show the signals of transient response to this major drainage change. The Ebro River, its upper catchment tributaries, and the Pyrenean tributaries have concave-up longitudinal profiles, concave hypsometric curves, and low hypsometric integrals, parameters typical of deeply dissected basins. This suggests a mature stage of development, controlled by the shift of the base level to the Mediterranean Sea. Iberian Range tributaries display low concavity profiles with numerous knickpoints and high values of hypsometric integral, indicating a transient state as a response to tectonic uplift, ratified by the values of mountain front sinuosity surrounding the basin.

The Lower Meuse Valley crosses the Roer Valley Rift System and provides an outstanding example of well-preserved late glacial and Holocene river terraces. The formation, preservation, and morphology of these terraces vary due to reach-specific conditions, a phenomenon that has been underappreciated in past studies. A detailed palaeogeographic reconstruction of the terrace series over the full length of the Lower Meuse Valley has been performed. This reconstruction provides improved insight into successive morphological responses to combined climatic and tectonic external forcing, as expressed and preserved in different ways along the river. New field data and data obtained from past studies were integrated using a digital mapping method in GIS. Results show that late glacial river terraces with diverse fluvial styles are best preserved in the Lower Meuse Valley downstream sub-reaches (traversing the Venlo Block and Peel Block), while Holocene terrace remnants are well-developed and preserved in the upstream sub-reaches (traversing the Campine Block and Roer Valley Graben). This reach-to-reach spatial variance in river terrace preservation and morphology can be ascribed to tectonically driven variations in river gradient and subsurface lithology, and to river-driven throughput of sediment supply.

We developed a 1108 yr chronology of tree-ring widths, based on 64 Himalayan pencil juniper (Juniperus semiglobosa Regel) trees, for the Pamir-Alay Mountains, central Asia. Dendroclimatological analysis demonstrates that precipitation has significant effects on tree growth in the semiarid mountainous area of northwestern Tajikistan located on the edge of the great midlatitude Karakum and Kyzylkum deserts. The highest level of linear correlation (r=0.67) is observed between tree growth and seasonalised winter (previous December–February) precipitation. Our studies also show that moisture (precipitation/Palmer Drought Severity Index) from the previous June to the current September was the dominant climatic factor accounting for interannual variations in tree-ring width, suggesting that this should be considered in climate reconstruction. Using the transfer function method, we reconstructed the region’s drought history over the period AD 908–2015. The results of this moisture reconstruction showed that the most recent millennium was characterised by series of dry and wet stages. The driest periods occurred before 1000, 1200–1250, and at the end of the eighteenth century and beginning of the nineteenth century. The wettest conditions existed in 1650–1700 and after 1990.

The Neotoma Paleoecology Database is a community-curated data resource that supports interdisciplinary global change research by enabling broad-scale studies of taxon and community diversity, distributions, and dynamics during the large environmental changes of the past. By consolidating many kinds of data into a common repository, Neotoma lowers costs of paleodata management, makes paleoecological data openly available, and offers a high-quality, curated resource. Neotoma’s distributed scientific governance model is flexible and scalable, with many open pathways for participation by new members, data contributors, stewards, and research communities. The Neotoma data model supports, or can be extended to support, any kind of paleoecological or paleoenvironmental data from sedimentary archives. Data additions to Neotoma are growing and now include >3.8 million observations, >17,000 datasets, and >9200 sites. Dataset types currently include fossil pollen, vertebrates, diatoms, ostracodes, macroinvertebrates, plant macrofossils, insects, testate amoebae, geochronological data, and the recently added organic biomarkers, stable isotopes, and specimen-level data. Multiple avenues exist to obtain Neotoma data, including the Explorer map-based interface, an application programming interface, the neotoma R package, and digital object identifiers. As the volume and variety of scientific data grow, community-curated data resources such as Neotoma have become foundational infrastructure for big data science.

Samples taken from sedimentary archives indicate that fungal non-pollen palynomorphs (NPPs) can be used to provide information on forest cover, fire regime, and depositional environment in the eastern Andean flank montane forest of Ecuador. Within the 52 samples examined, 54 fungal NPP morphotypes are reported, of which 25 were found to be previously undescribed. Examination of fungal NPPs over a gradient of forest cover (2–64%) revealed three distinct assemblages: (1) low (<8%) forest cover Neurospora, IBB-16, HdV-201, OU-102, and OU-110 indicative of an open degraded landscape; (2) medium (8–32%) forest cover Cercophora-type 1, Xylariaceae, Rosellinia-type, Kretzschmaria deusta, Amphirosellinia, Sporormiella, and Glomus suggestive of a forested landscape disturbed by herbivores and soil erosion; and (3) high (32–63%) forest cover Anthostomella fuegiana, OU-5, OU-101, OU-108, and OU-120. Environmental variables for forest cover (forest pollen), available moisture (aquatic remains), regional fire regime (microcharcoal), and sediment composition (organic carbon) were found to explain ~40% of the variance in the fungal NPP data set. Fire was found to be the primary control on fungal NPP assemblage composition, with available moisture and sediment composition the next most important factors.

Inland dune fields have recently emerged as a source of data for reconstructing paleoenvironments and climate in the western Great Lakes region of North America during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. We employ optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) methods, radiocarbon ages, soils, and landform relationships to determine the age of inland dunes in Ottawa County, Michigan. These dunes rest on the abandoned bed of Glacial Lake Chicago, which is thought to have been exposed after ~13.6 ka. OSL analyses from two inland dunes yield ages ranging from 13.3±1.1 to 11.6±0.9 ka (uncertainty=2σ). Fine sand in the parabolic dunes suggests deflation of exposed glaciolacustrine nearshore sand by northwesterly and westerly winds. These new data add to a growing number of studies that demonstrate widespread eolian activity in the western Great Lakes region during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. OSL ages from dune fields in the western Great Lakes indicate peak eolian activity and dune stabilization occurred during or following the Younger Dryas and Preboreal events. Northwesterly and westerly winds suggest the limited effect of hypothesized easterly anticyclonic winds during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. Rapidly changing climate and newly deglaciated surfaces provided an ideal environment for dune formation.