Fellow: Geert van der Plas
Supervision: Dirk Verschuren
Host Institution: Limnology Unit, Department of Biology, Ghent University
Duration: 3 years – beginning December 2013
Project description: “Millennial scale landscape and environmental change in the northern Rift Valley and Mount Kilimanjaro regions”
In my project I will reconstruct past interactions of humans with their environment, driven by natural climate variability. With the use of subfossil plant pollen, fungal spores, and charcoal, I will characterise past vegetation and ecosystem changes in the northern Rift Valley and Mount Kilimanjaro regions.
Fossil pollen
The aim is to produce high resolution, radiocarbon-dated reconstructions that allow direct comparison with historical and archaeological records, in order to ascertain changes in ancient land use.
My main study sites will include Lakes Baringo, Bogoria, Simbi, Duluti and Challa. As my project starts to take shape I will keep you up-to-date through this webpage!
photo credits: Naturalis, earthsci.st-andrews.ac.uk, www.flmnh.ufl.ed