Analysis of coastal zone development through space/time modelling

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Jan Harff
• Subject Area: Palaeontology
• Term: from 2002 to 2007
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 5469791

The research program targets the development of models that mirror the relation between driving forces and reactions of the geo/eco/socio-economic system described by qualitative and quantitative variables at the sinking coasts of the southern Baltic Sea on time scales of millennia. The cause and effect relation will be described by different types of models, from multivariate statistical approaches to differential equations, depending on the quantification of the processes' description. These models are to be used for reconstructions of the history of the system and its components as well as for the derivation of prognostic scenarios relative sea level change by forward modelling. Proxy-variables which can be measured at geo/biological samples and artifacts that represent the palaeo processes play a key role in the historical reconstruction by calibrating the models for forward modelling. The development of a high resolution time scale ranging between 8.000 calendar years BC (beginning Litorina transgression) and 2800 AD (end of climate prognosis) based on physical and biological methods of dating is needed for the process description. The spatial and temporal indication will be given by a space/time geoinformation system, to be developed in part within the project. Results will be presented as regionalisations of geo-, eco- and socio-economic parameters as functions of time.

• DFG Programme: Research Units
• Subproject of: FOR 488: Sinking Coasts: Geosphere, Ecosphere and Anthroposphere of the Holocene Southern Baltic Sea
• Participating Persons: Professor Dr. Reinhard Lampe; Privatdozent Dr. Wolfram Lemke