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People | Institute of Earth Sciences

People

Yael  Amitai

Yael Amitai

Ph.D student, supervised by Hezi Gildor and Yossi Ashkenazy
 

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Research subject: Changes in deep water formation in the Eastern Mediterranean.

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Dov Avigad

Dov Avigad

Professor

 

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I combine field and laboratory studies to understand the origin of Earth's continental crust, its composition and architecture. Within this broad research avenue, I concentrate on aspects of continental tectonics with emphasis on Precambrian crustal evolution, old and young orogenic belts, continental extensional tectonics, and the link between orogeny, erosion and sedimentation. With my students and colleagues, we seek to unravel plate tectonics processes around the Eastern Mediterranean with special emphasis on the Cadomian and Avalonian continental collage of SE Europe and Asia Minor, Precambrian crustal evolution of the Arabian-Nubian Shield, the provenance of the great Paleozoic sandstone of northern Africa and Arabia and its linkage to Pan-African orogens.

 

Curriculum Vitae

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YBD sampling GFZ

Dr. Yoav Ben Dor

Postdoctoral fellow, advised by Yigal Erel and Mordechai Stein

 

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Research interests: Paleoclimate, hydrology, limnology, sedimentary petrography, sedimentology, pedology, quaternary research, geochronology

Reasearch Topic: Saharan dust & the Neolithic Agriculture Revolution in the Jordan Valley

 

Abstract:

My current study focuses on the environmental and soil-related conditions in the Levant that could have provided prehistoric humans with the advantages required to initiate the Neolithic Agriculture Revolution (NAR) following the end of the last glacial period (~15th to 11th millennium BP). We investigate the properties and origins of soils and sedimentary sequences that accumulated prior, during and after the NAR with close context to renowned archaeological sites including Gilgal, Netiv Hagdud and Fazael, and analyze them within the broad climatological and hydrological framework. Through this inter-disciplinary study of the soils that served the earliest farmers of the Levant, we wish to see whether local conditions that followed the last glacial period provided an unplanned natural advantage to the people that inhabited the Jordan Valley. This research relies on establishing the chronology of the studied sections using OSL and 14C dating techniques, and further sedimentary and soil-related analyses, which include detailed field description and mapping, soil texture and grain-size measurements, and other fertility-related properties such as exchangeable cations composition, sodium and potassium adsorption, available sulfur and phosphorus, as well as chemical and multiple isotopic analyses.

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