Thanks to the support of the Graduate School of Geosciences, I was able to attend the second IGCP 610 "From the Caspian to the Mediterranean: Environmental Change and Human Response during the Quaternary" meeting in Baku. This conference perfectly suits my PhD-project, which investigates the Holocene landscape evolution along the Black Sea coast of Georgia. During the first plenary meeting in Tbilisi ,Georgia, in 2013, I introduced the aims of my project in a poster. However, in Baku, I was able to present the first results of my research in a talk titled "Landscape evolution of the Kolkheti lowlands during the last five millennia — A geoarchaeological project on the Black Sea Coast of Georgia". Because of the focus on the Ponto-Caspian region, all participants are working in more or less the same areas and under comparable conditions. Therefore, I was able to compare my results with those of my colleagues and to share my experiences regarding laboratory methods as well as fieldwork in the
Caucasus region. 
After two days of presentations the conference programme continued with five days filled with fieldtrips to the shore and the Western part of Azerbaijan. Meanwhile, we visited different sites representing the different Quaternary transgression stages of the Caspian Sea and the pre- and protohistory of the Caspian region.
The participation in the IGCP 610 meeting helped me to increase my knowledge about the Ponto Caspian region and to get involved with the local scientific community as well as with international researchers working in the area. It was only possible with the support of the GSGS travel grant.
PhD student
Institute of Geography
PhD thesis: The Rioni-Delta and the burial ground of Pichvnari – a geoarchaeological research at the Black Sea coast of Georgia