I am an environmental scientist specializing in paleoclimatic reconstruction of the Quaternary period. I graduated in Environmental Science from the University of Pisa in 2022, with a thesis focused on the 4.2 ka event in the central Mediterranean area. My research involved the study of four speleothems from Sarmidda Cave and Predargiu Cave (Sardinia, Italy), Stiffe Cave (Abruzzo, Italy), and Momichek Cave (Macedonia). Currently, I am pursuing a PhD in Geosciences and Environment at the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Pisa. The title of my project is “Paleoclimatic reconstruction of the last glacial period in Eurasia through speleothems: implications for the extinction of the Neanderthal (Homo neanderthalensis)” with the main aims to reconstruct the climate of the last glacial period, specifically between 60,000 and 20,000 years ago, in the Eurasian region using proxy data from speleothems. This study is important because it offers new insights into the climate and environmental conditions that coincided with the extinction of Homo neanderthalensis, which occurred around 45,000 to 30,000 years ago. This research is part of the ERC-Synergy 2024 project "LAST NEANDERTHALS" and follows a multidisciplinary and collaborative approach. The goal is to provide new, high-resolution cultural, biological, and environmental data, offering a fresh perspective on the population dynamics of the last Neanderthals and providing a comprehensive explanation of the mechanisms behind their extinction. The study emphasizes the need for collaboration across Earth Sciences and Historical-Anthropological disciplines to understand how climate change influenced the behaviour and evolution of human communities in the past, particularly Homo neanderthalensis. The findings from past periods can also help make projections about the evolution of our species in the context of current and future global climate changes.
RESEARCH INTEREST
- Isotopic paleoclimatology
- Geochronology of continental sediments
- Speleology and exploration of karst systems
- Environmental geochemistry of karst systems
- Palaeoanthropology
Research project: Paleoclimatic reconstruction of the last glacial period in Eurasia through speleothems: implications for the extinction of the Neanderthal (Homo neanderthalensis).
Supervisors:
Dr Andrea Columbu (DST-UNIPI)
Professor Giovanni Zanchetta (DST-UNIPI
Giulia Cheli
Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra
Università di Pisa
Via Santa Maria 53
56126 Pisa
Italia