Scientists Develop Multiproxy Modern Analogues for Palaeo-Ecological Studies in the Central Ganga Plain
A team of researchers from the Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeosciences (BSIP) has developed a modern analogue dataset based on biotic and abiotic proxy records from different depositional settings across two interfluves of the Central Ganga Plain (CGP). The study, published in the journal Catena, evaluated the strength and weaknesses of biotic and abiotic proxy records of the Ghaghara-Gandak and Ganga-Ghaghara interfluves of CGP and assessed how reliably multiproxy modern analogues can identify different ecological and depositional environments.
The CGP, which serves as a food basket for thickly populated India, is undergoing significant upheavals in terms of climatic variability in recent decades. Future scenario assessment requires rigorous climate models built utilizing key data inputs emerged from well-dated palaeo-reconstructions.
The study aimed to generate modern proxies that can help distinguish different ecology and depositional environments at the appropriate spatial scale, which is vital for decoding the past environment in the CGP. The interfluve regions are important for past environmental and modern analogue studies as they are comprised of different depositional environments, such as fluvial, lacustrine, forest, and croplands. The soil/sediment samples were complemented with biotic and abiotic proxies, such as pollen, diatoms, phytoliths, sediment texture, stable carbon and nitrogen isotopes, XRD/XRF elements, and magnetic susceptibility parameters.
The modern comprehensive dataset could provide background information for Late Quaternary palaeo-ecological reconstruction from the Central Ganga Plain along with the practices for preserving and conserving the endangered biodiversity that flourishes in forests, crops, lakes, and rivers system of this region. The study of biotic and abiotic interactions is important as they aid in building the forest community, food crops, agro-pastoral and human settlements in this region.
The inception of human settlement in this region could be traced through the establishment of marker pollen, phytolith, and diatom taxa. The study would help measure the dynamics of the natural vegetation and the shifts in human occupation over time for future scenario development. The different cultural pollen taxa apprised how human-associated changes have reduced the forest cover in the CGP, and hence those forest trees should be plated that can generate and sustain our life-supporting system by giving out oxygen and also combat the rising CO2 levels by carbon sequestration.
The lakes of the CGP, which were once proliferated with water and supported human settlement, are presently drying up and need to be preserved and cleaned so that the rich biodiversity flourishing in and around the lakes could be used for sustainable future development. The various proxies used in this study helps in generating eco-environmental prospect of wetland and sediments status in this region. The multiparameter study could also be viewed as an important baseline for conserving different lakes and river systems, often treated as wastelands to be drained, filled, and converted for other purposes.
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