Inter-congress Report - 2011-2015
1. CMP Mission
CMP corresponding membership is open to any Quaternary scientist working on themes of
the deep sea, continental shelves, and on the reconstruction of coastal and sea-level
changes and the mechanisms underlying these changes. There are 421 members on our
email distribution list.
2. CMP Officers
President: Roland Gehrels (University of York, UK)
Vice-President: Yusuke Yokoyama (University of Tokyo, Japan)
Secretary: Craig Sloss (Queensland University of Technology, Australia)
Advisory board members: Yongqiang Zong (Hong Kong), Mark Bateman (UK), Cari Zazo
(Spain), Gösta Hoffmann (Oman), Ediang Okuku Archibong (Nigeria), Barbara Mauz (UK),
Fatima Abrantes (Portugal), Cecile Baeteman (Belgium), Ben Horton (USA).
3. INQUA funds (in EUR) allocated to CMP during the 2011-2015 InterCongress period
Project (P)
IFG (F)
Skills (S)
0501P
1001P
Title
PI
2011
Black SeaMediterranean
Corridor during last
30 ky: Sea level
change and human
adaptation
strategies
Quaternary coastal
change and records
of extreme marine
YankoHombach
5000
Sloss
5000
2012
2013
2014
2015
1101P
1201P
1202P
1203P
1204P
1223S
1301F
1401F
TOTAL
inundation on
coastal
environments.
Evolution of
Continental Shelves
during the Late
Quaternary
PALSEA:
Palaeorecords of
sea-level change, ice
sheet extent and
high-latitude climate
Rapid environmental
changes and human
impact on
continental shelves
Mediterranean sea
level change and
projection for future
flooding (MedFlood)
The Quaternary
countourite logbook: a deep water
record(er) of
variability in
palaeoclimate,
palaeocaenography
and deep-water
ecosystems
Implications of
palaeoclimatic and
sea level changes on
coastal evolution:
are humans
adapting? (WAQUA)
PALSEA2: PALeoconstraints on SEAlevel rise 2
SHELVES: Rapid
environmental
changes and human
activity impacting
continental shelf
systems
Chiocci
5000
Carlson
5000
Hanebuth
5000
Rovere,
Flinders
5000
5000
Van Rooij
5000
4000
Addo
3000
Long,
Milne
8000
Barrie
5000
5000
8000
8000
8000
15000
23000
17000
21000
13000
4. Working groups
Five Working Groups were established at the Congress in Bern. These working groups will no
longer operate in the next INQUA inter-congressional period. Under the Statutes of INQUA
only Projects, International Focus Groups and Skills can be supported by INQUA.
The working groups were:
 North & West Europe (Kim Cohen – Netherlands). This group was in 2014 recognised
as a working group by the UK Quaternary Research Association and will continue to
function under the name Sea Level and Coastal Change working group (SLaCC).
 Continental Shelves (Till Hanebuth – Germany). This group became an International
Focus Group in 2013.
 Long-term sea-level changes (Teresa Bardaji – Spain)
 Australasia (David Kennedy – Australia)
 Chronology and dating (Henk Heijnis – Australia)
Activities of working groups have been reported in the annual reports which are available
on the INQUA website.
5. Conferences
2012
 Sea-Level and Adjustment of the Land Observations and Models (SLALOM), Athens,
Greece, 19-22 March.
 Sea Level Changes into MIS 5: from Observations to Predictions, Mallorca, Spain, 1014 April.
 12th International Coral Reef Symposium, Cairns, Australia, 9-13 July.
 34th International Geological Congress, Brisbane, Australia, 5-10 August.
 MEDFLOOD project: MEDiterranean sea-level change and projection for future
FLOODing, first annual meeting, Rome, Italy, 25 September.
 3rd IGCP588 conference, Kiel, Germany, 4-10 September
 Session on “Ocean Warming and Freshwater Contributions to Regional and Global
Sea Level” at AGU Fall meeting, San Francisco, USA, 2-7 December.
2013
 ABEQUA 2013 (Brazilian Association of Quaternary Sciences), August 4-8 in Natal,
Brazil. The project 1202 session “Rapid Environmental Changes And Human Impact
On Continental Shelves “ was chaired by H. Vital (University of Rio Grande do Norte,
Brazil), Tadeu Reis (University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), and Moab Gomes (University
of Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil).
 30th IAS 2013 (International Association of Sedimentologists) conference,
September 2-5 in Manchester, UK. INQUA Project 1202 session “Climate changes
and human impact on continental shelves” was chaired by V. Pascucci (University of
Sassari, Italy), H. Vital (University of Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil) and F.J. Lobo
(Spanish Research Council).

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
2014
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
GEOHAB 2013 (Marine Geological and Habitat Mapping), May 6-10 in Rome, Italy.
INQUA Project 1202 will publish a Special Issue “Geoscience and Habitat Mapping for
Marine Renewable Energy” to be published in Continental Shelf Research.
INQUA Project 1204 and IGCP Project 619 joint meeting, January 28-29 in Hull, UK.
“Dialogue between contourite and oceanography processes”. Organised by M.
Rogerson (Hull) and s. Legg (Princeton).
PALSEA2 annual meeting (IFG 1301), October 21-25, Rome
Sessions at the American Geophysical Union 2013 meeting in San Francisco, (co-)
sponsored by IFG 1301 (PALSEA2):
Monday: PP13E (1:40-3:40), PP14B (4:00-6:00), PP21B (Tuesday Posters) North Atlantic Climate during the Pliocene and Quaternary
Wednesday: GC31A (8-12:20, Posters) GC33D (1:40-3:40), GC34A (4:00-6:00), Magnitudes and Mechanisms of Ice Sheet Melt, Sea-level Changes, and Coastal
Inundation: Past and Future
Friday: PP51D (8-10 AM), PP53B (1:40-6, Posters) - Paleo-Sealevel: Core Record
and Modeling Constraints on Rates and Processes
Monday: PP13E (1:40-3:40), PP14B (4:00-6:00), PP21B (Tuesday Posters) - North
Atlantic Climate during the Pliocene and Quaternary
Wednesday: GC31A (8-12:20, Posters) GC33D (1:40-3:40), GC34A (4:00-6:00), Magnitudes and Mechanisms of Ice Sheet Melt, Sea-level Changes, and Coastal
Inundation: Past and Future
Friday: PP51D (8-10 AM), PP53B (1:40-6, Posters) - Paleo-Sealevel: Core Record
and Modeling Constraints on Rates and Processes
Sessions co-sponsored by IFG 1301 at PAGES Open Science Meeting, Goa
India (12-16 Feb 2013):
OSM07: Sensitivity of the cryosphere: past and future
OSM10: Sea level change and the coastal zone: Threats for human societies.
MEDFLOOD (Project 1203) annual meeting, Athens, October 14-18.
PALSEA2 annual meeting (IFG 1301), September 16-23, Lochinver, Scotland.
MEDFLOOD (Project 1203) annual meeting, Haifa, Israel, October 20-25.
Shelves annual meeting, San Francisco, 16 December.
INQUA / IGCP588 Field Meeting, 30 June – 3 July, Cork, Ireland.
Sessions at AGU, San Francisco:
Sea level, ice sheets, and high-latitude climates during previous warm periods.
Conveners: Anders Carlson, Andrea Dutton, Fiona Hibbert, Mark Tamisiea
Ice margin and climate changes on Greenland: Contemporary through Holocene.
Conveners: Meredith Kelly, Laura Levy, Jason Briner, Bea Csatho.
Connecting Climate Projections to Responses in Coastal and Continental Shelf
Environments. Conveners: T. Hanebuth, V. Barrie.
 Sessions at Geological Society of America Annual Meeting, 19-22 October,
Vancouver:
Sea-level rise and salt-marsh response: a paleo perspective (T181). Conveners: Andy
Kemp, Benjamin Horton, Jim Morris.
Sea-level changes from minutes to millennia (T30). Conveners: Simon Engelhart,
Benjamin Horton, Adam Switzer.
Microfossils in the Coastal Zone: Indicators of coastal change over short- and longterm timescales. Conveners: Andrea Hawkes, Jessica Pilarczyk, Tina Dura.
 Session at the International Sedimentological Congress, 22 August, University of
Geneva:
Climate changes on continental shelves: natural events and human impacts.
Conveners: V. Pascucci, F.J. Lobo, H. Vital.
6. Noteworthy publications (selection only)
2011
 Special PALSEA issue in Earth and Planetary Science Letters (v. 315-316), including
eleven papers.
 Special IGCP588 issue in Quaternary Science Reviews (v. 54), including eleven papers.
Carlson, A.E., Clark, P.U., 2012, Ice-sheet sources of sea-level rise and freshwater discharge
during the last deglaciation: Reviews of Geophysics 50, doi: 10.1029/ 2011RG000371.
Carlson, A.E., Winsor, K., 2012. Northern Hemisphere ice-sheet responses to past climate
warming. Nature Geoscience 5, 607-613.
Dutton, A., Lambeck, K., 2012. Ice volume and sea level during the Last Interglacial. Science
337, 216-219.
Goto, K., Chagué-Goff, C., Fujino, S., Goff, J., Jaffe, B., Nishimura, Y., Richmond, B.,
Sugawara, D., Szczuciński, W., Tappin, D.R., Witter, R., Yulianto, E., 2011. New insights
into tsunami risk from the 2011 Tohoku-oki event. Marine Geology 290, 46-50.
Falcini, F., Khan, N.S., Macelloni, L., Horton, B.P., Lutken, C,B., McKee, L., Santoleri, R.,
Colella, S., Li, C., Volpe, G., D'Emidio, M., Salusti, A., Jerolmack, D.J., 2012. Linking the
historic 2011 Mississippi River flood to coastal wetland sedimentation. Nature
Geoscience 5, 803-807.
Gasson, E., Siddall, M., Lunt, D.J., Rackham, O.J.L., Lear, C.H., Pollard, D., 2012, Exploring
uncertainties in the relationship between temperature, ice volume, and sea level over
the past 50 million years, Reviews of Geophysics 50, doi 10.1029/2011RG000358.
Gehrels, W.R., Woodworth, P.L., 2013. When did modern rates of sea-level rise start? Global
and Planetary Change 100, 263-277.
Gregoire, L.J., Payne, A.J., Valdes, P.J., 2012. Deglacial rapid sea level rises caused by icesheet saddle collapses. Nature 487, 219–222.
Hanebuth, T.J.J., Voris, H.K., Yokoyama, Y., Saito, Y., Okuno, J.i., 2011. Formation and fate of
sedimentary depocentres on Southeast Asia's Sunda Shelf over the past sea-level cycle
and biogeographic implications. Earth-Science Reviews 104, 92-110.
Rovere, A., Raymo, M.E., O'Leary, M.J., Hearty, P.J., 2012. Crowdsourcing in the Quaternary
sea level community: insights from the Pliocene. Quaternary Science Reviews 56, 164166.
Siddall, M., Milne, G.A., 2012, Understanding sea-level change is impossible without both
insights from paleo studies and working across disciplines. Earth and Planetary Science
Letters 315-316, 2-3.
Törnqvist, T.E., Hijma, M.P., 2012. Links between early Holocene ice-sheet decay, sea-level
rise and abrupt climate change. Nature Geoscience 5, 601-606.
Woodroffe, C.D., Murray-Wallace, C.M., 2012. Sea-level rise and coastal change: the past as
a guide to the future. Quaternary Science Reviews 54, 4-11.
2013
 Continental shelf drowned landscapes (INQUA-CMP Project 1202 and IGCP-526), by
Cohen, K.M. & Lobo, F.J. (guest editors). Geomorphology Special Issue, Volume 203,
pp. 1-148, 1 December 2013. ISSN: 0169-555X.
Anders, J.B., Wallace, D.J., Simms, A.X., Rodriguez, A.B., Miliken, K.T., 2013, Variable
response of coastal environments of the northwestern Gulf of Mexico to sea-level
rise and climate change: Implications for future changes: Marine Geology, doi:
10.1016/j.margeo.2013.12.008.
Barlow, N.L.M., Shennan, I., Long, A.J., Gehrels, W.R., Saher, M.H., Woodroffe, S.A., Hiller, C.,
2013, Salt marshes as late Holocene tide gauges. Global and Planetary Change, 106,
90-110.
Bender, V.B., Hanebuth, T.J.J., Chiessi, C.M., 2013. Holocene shifts of the Subtropical Shelf
Front off southeastern South America controlled by high and low latitude forcing.
Paleoceanography 28, 1-10. doi:10.1002/palo.20044.
Chen, C.H., Wen, S., Yeh, T.K., Wang, C.H., Yen, H.Y., Liu, J.Y., Hobara, Y., Han, P., 2013.
Observation of surface displacements from GPS analyses before and after the
Jiashian earthquake (M=6.4) in Taiwan. Journal of Asian Earth Sciences, 62:662-671.
Chiverrell, R.C., Thrasher, I., Thomas, G.S.P., Lang, A., Scourse, J.D., Van Landeghem, K.J.J.,
Mccarroll, D., Clark, C., Ó'Cofaigh, C., Evans, D.J.A. and Ballantyne, C.K. 2013 Bayesian
modelling the retreat of the Irish Sea Ice Stream. Journal of Quaternary Science 28,
200-209.
Hall, G.F., Hill, D.F., Horton, B.P., Engelhart, S.E., Peltier, W.R., 2013. A high-resolution study
of tides in the Delaware Bay: Past conditions and future scenarios. Geophysical
Research Letters, 40, 338-342.
Hanebuth, T.J.J., Kudrass, H.R., Linstädter, .J, Islam, B., Zander, A.M., 2013. Rapid coastal
subsidence in the central Ganges-Brahmaputra Delta (Bangladesh) since the 17th
century deduced from submerged salt-producing kilns. Geology 41 (9), 987-990.
doi:10.1130/G34646.1.
Hanebuth, T.J.J., Mersmeyer, H., Kudrass, H.R., Westphal, H., 2013. Aeolian to shallowmarine shelf architecture off a major desert since the Late Pleistocene (Northern
Mauritania). Geomorphology 203, 132-147. doi: 10.1016/j.geomorph.2013.08.031.
Horton, B.P., Engelhart, S.E., Hill, D.F., Kemp, A.C., Nikitina, D., Miller, K.G., Peltier, W.R.,
2013. Influence of tidal-range change and sediment compaction on Holocene relative
sea-level change in New Jersey, USA. Journal of Quaternary Science, 28, 403-411.
Kemp, A.C., Horton, B.P., 2013. Contribution of relative sea-level rise to historical hurricane
flooding in New York City. Journal of Quaternary Science, 28, 537-541.
Kemp, A.C., Horton, B.P., Vane, C.H., Bernhardt, C.E., Corbett, D.R., Englehart, S.E., Anisfeld,
S.C., Parnell, A.C., Cahill, N., 2013. Sea-level change during the last 2500 years in
New Jersey, USA. Quaternary Science Reviews, 81, 90-104.
Rovere, A., Raymo, M. E., Mitrovica, J. X., Hearty, P. J., OʼLeary, M. J., Inglis, J. D. (2014). The
Mid- Pliocene sea-level conundrum: Glacial isostasy, eustasy and dynamic
topography.
Earth
and
Planetary
Science
Letters,
387,
27–33.
doi:10.1016/j.epsl.2013.10.030.
Vacchi, M., Rovere, A., Chatzipetros, A., Zouros, N., Firpo, M. (2013). An updated database
of Holocene relative sea level changes in NE Aegean Sea. Quaternary International,
doi:10.1016/j.quaint.2013.08.036.
2014
Barlow, N.L.M., Long, A.J., Saher, M.H., Gehrels, R.W., Garnett, M., Scaife, R.G. 2014. Saltmarsh reconstructions of relative sea level in the North Atlantic during the last 2000
years. Quaternary Science Reviews, 99, 1-16.
Carlson, A.E., Winsor, K. ,Ullman, D.J., Brook, E.J., Rood, D.H., Axford, Y., LeGrande, A.N.,
Anslow, F.S., Sinclair, G., 2014, Earliest Holocene south Greenland ice-sheet retreat
within its late-Holocene extent: Geophyscial Research Letters, doi:
10.1002/2014GL060800.
de Boer, B., Lourens, L.J., van de Wal, R.S.W., 2014. Persistent 400,000 year variability of
Antarctic ice volume and the carbon cycle is revealed throughout the PlioPleistocene, Nature Communications, doi: 10.1038/ncomms3999.
Horton, B.P., Rahmstorf, S., Engelhart, S.E., Kemp, A.C., 2014, Expert assessment of sea-level
rise by AD 2100 and AD 2300: Quaternary Science Reviews 84, 1-6.
Kopp, R.E., R. M. Horton, C. M. Little, J. X. Mitrovica, M. Oppenheimer, D. J. Rasmussen, B. H.
Strauss, and C. Tebaldi (2014). Probabilistic 21st and 22nd century sea-level
projections at a global network of tide gauge sites. Earth's Future 2: 287–306,
doi:10.1002/2014EF000239.
Lecavalier, B.S., G.A. Milne, M.J.R. Simpson, L. Wake, P. Huybrechts, L. Tarasov, K.K.
Kjeldsen, S. Funder, A.J. Long, S.A. Woodroffe, A.S. Dyke & N.K Larsen. A model of
Greenland ice sheet deglaciation constrained by observations of relative sea level
and ice extent. Quaternary Science Reviews, 102, 54-84, 2014.
Long, A.J., Barlow, N.L.M, Gehrels, W.R., Saher, M.H., Woodworth, P.L., Scaife, R.G., Brain,
M.J., Cahill, N., 2014, Constraining records of sea-level change in the eastern and
western North Atlantic during the last 300 years: Earth and Planetary Science Letters
388, 110-122.
Reyes, A.V., Carlson, A.E., Beard, B.L., Hatfield, R.G., Stoner, J.S., Winsor, K., Welke, B., and
Ullman, D.J., 2014, South Greenland ice-sheet collapse during Marine Isotope Stage
11: Nature, v. 510, p. 525-528.
Rovere, A., Raymo, M.E., Mitrovica, J.X., Hearty, P.J., O’Leary, M.J., Inglis, J.D., 2014, The
Mid-Pliocene sea-level conundrum: Glacial isostasy, eustasy and dynamic
topography: Earth and Planetary Science Letters 387, 27-33.
Wolstencroft, M., Z. Shen, T.E. Törnqvist, G.A. Milne, and M. Kulp. Understanding
subsidence in the Mississippi Delta region due to sediment, ice, and ocean loading:
Insights from geophysical modeling. Journal of Geophysical Research – Solid Earth,
119(4), 3838-3856, 2014.
Woodroffe, S.A., Long, A.J., Lecavalier, B.S., Milne, G.A. & Bryant, C.L. 2014. Using relative
sea-level data to constrain the deglacial and Holocene history of southern
Greenland. Quaternary Science Reviews, 92, 345-356.
7. CMP sessions at the XIX Congress in Nagoya
C01 Sea-level and cryospheric changes in the last 2000 years (Zong)
C02 Coastal wetlands (Fujimoto)
C03 Palaeoceanography and geochemical tools (Ohkouchi)
C04 Palaeo sea-level records (Yokoyama)
C05 Asian monsoon and coastal evolution (Tamura)
C06 Coastal land-sea interactions (Bateman)
C07 Postglacial drowning of continental shelves (Mellett)
C08 Ice-sheet variability in warm climates (Carlson)
C09 Palaeoceanographic variability from contourites (Van Rooij)
C10 Rapid environmental change and human activity impacting continental shelves (Barrie)
C11 Deltas (Saito)
C12 Comparative Paleoecology of the Subarctic Marine System (Fitzhugh)
C13 Temporal changes in sea level (Horton)
C14 Late Quaternary palaeovalley systems (Amorosi)
8. Preparations for the next Inter-Congress Period
Nominations for the next Inter-congress Commission Officers have been proposed by the
members. The following Officers have been proposed:
President: Craig Sloss (Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia)
Vice Presidents: Anders Carlson (Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon, USA), Yusuke
Yokoyama (University of Tokyo, Japan)
Secretary: Lynda Petherick (Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, Suzhou, China)
Advisory Group: TBC
9. Awards
The following PALSEA2 members received awards in 2014:
Robert Kopp (Rutgers) – Leopold Leadership Fellow
Jonathan Bamber (Bristol) – Wolfson Research Merit Award
Ben Horton (Rutgers) – AGU Ocean Sciences Voyager Award
Kurt Lambeck- Matthew Flinders Medal from the Australian Academy of Science
Maureen Raymo (LDEO) – Milutin Milankovic Medal from EGU
Robert Kopp will also be awarded the INQUA Shackleton medal in 2015.