Wandel Dal Project

With this project, our interdisciplinary team seeks to understand the climate history of Tunup Avannaarsua and to place the Paleo-Inuit occupation of Wandel Dal into a broader climate perspective. Using the site "Pearylandville" on the shores of Nedre Midsommersø (Lower Midsummer Lake) as our base, we will retrieve and analyze lake sediment cores from the lake (and nearby lakes) to understand the ~5000-year climate history of this region including temperature, rainfall, lake ice cover, as well as the presence of terrestrial plants and animals. We will also map the key archaeological features of the lake and adjacent fjord, and better constrain the timing of these sites and their occupation. Together with modelling, we will develop a comprehensive understanding of the human-climate interactions in Wandel Dal and how they relate to broader shifts in glacier fluctuations, ocean circulation, and polynya dynamics, and the Holocene climate history of the Arctic.

Funded by NSF 2022-2025