The Quaternary (spanning the last 2.6 million years), is characterized by intense environmental changes with,
- repeated glacial-interglacial cycles, shaping landscapes and biodiversity throughout the Pleistocene, and
- the increase of human impact during the Holocene (which began around 11,700 years).
From ca mid Holocene, changes in land-use (with agriculture, urbanization, industrialization) deeply shaped the environments, impacting terrestrial ecosystems and geosystems while climate variability occurred at several scales during the Holocene. Understanding the Quaternary period is therefore crucial for comprehending Earth’s climatic and environmental dynamics, in the current context of long-term anthropogenic and climate forcings. Studying sedimentary records, paleoclimate proxies, together with archaeological findings provides valuable insights into the interplay between natural processes and human activities.
This course will provide a concise overview of the paleoecological disciplines involved in multidisciplinary studies carried out on terrestrial environments. Subsequently, teaching activities will illustrate, through specific case studies, the contribution of these disciplines to the study of Pleistocene climatic variability (glacial-interglacial alternations), followed by case studies of Holocene mountain sequences (lakes and mires), aiming to reconstruct the respective roles of anthropogenic and climatic forcings on the trajectory of ecosystems and geosystems (watersheds, rivers, lakes).
Quaternary, sedimentology, palaeoecology, geochemistry, terrestrial ecosystems, Pleistocene, Holocene, climate, land-use
