Deciphering orbital and suborbital signatures from lacustrine sediments: Insights into the MIS-3 and the Last Termination in Northwest Africa

Swiss partners

• ETH Zürich: Heather Stoll (main applicant)

Partners in the MENA region

• Université Mohammed VI Polytechnique, Maroc: Yassine Ait Brahim (main applicant), Khalil Azennoud

• University of Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah, Maroc: Abdennasser Baali

Presentation of the projet

Region of interest: Northwest Africa, Lake Ifrah (Middle Atlas, Morocco)
Main objectives:

• Further explore the relationship between precession minima and sustained high lake levels and propose mechanisms that may be involved to explain the effect of the cause.
• Decipher the suborbital signatures (HSs and GSs) from lacustrine offshore facies deposited presumably during MIS-3.
• Address deliberately the question of the Last Termination, whose information is seriously lacking in NW Africa, and the relationships between the Saharan wind intensity and its signature in the studied lake basin.
• Attempt to conduct quantitative reconstruction of palaeotemperature using clumped isotopes combined with trace elements.
• Build a model to showcase the orbital control on sedimentation dynamics using the sequence stratigraphic approach in an interior basin case.

Research method:

• Sampling water, sediments, and plant remains/charcoals (for radiocarbon dating).
• Taxonomic IDing of ostracod fauna and petrographic examination of carbonate layers.
• Analytical work for isotopes and trace elements, total organic carbon, and grain size measurements.
• Radiocarbon dating of 10 samples.