Abstract
A PERENNIAL problem in using evidence of changing lake levels and river activity to reconstruct Quaternary environments in East Africa stems from our frequent inability to distinguish between effects produced by volcanic and tectonic activity and those related to climatic change. We report here evidence for roughly synchronous changes in lake levels in the volcanically and tectonically active regions of southern Afar and the Ethiopian Rift, which parallel those reported from the Sahel1, the Nile valley2, Kenya3 and Saudi Arabia4. Such synchronous changes in lake levels, allied to independent evidence of moister conditions during phases of high lake levels, are best explained through regional fluctuations in climate.
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WILLIAMS, M., BISHOP, P., DAKIN, F. et al. Late Quaternary lake levels in southern Afar and the adjacent Ethopian Rift. Nature 267, 690–693 (1977). https://doi.org/10.1038/267690a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/267690a0
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