LABORATORY FOR HISTORICAL ECOLOGY

The Laboratory’s main objective is the study of the patterns of historical development of contemporary ecosystems, accomplished through comprehensive research on deposits of various origins: zoogenic deposits in caves and niches, peat lands, archaeological sites, buried soils, and coastal sediments. These reflect the age-old structures of and changes in ecosystems, the history of the ranges of specific species and groups of animals and plants, changes in morphological characteristics and ecology of dominant species, and also the general pattern of contemporary biogeocenoses evolution in the Holocene.  The various methodologies used are radiocarbon dating, osteological, helminthological, spore-pollen, phytolithic, botanical, dendro-climatochronological analysis of stable isotopes, and others. The main focus is on determining patterns of secular dynamics of modern ecosystems of the Northern Hemisphere. In recent years there have been carried out studies of the coastal ecosystems of the Bering Sea (Chukotka, Commander and Aleutian Islands), forest ecosystems of European Russia (Moscow, Tver, and Vologda Oblasts) and the Northern Caucasus, arid ecosystems of Mongolia and the Negev Desert (Israel), and Ethiopian highland ecosystems.

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