The surface waters of the Humboldt Current System along the west coast of South America play a key role in maintaining the hyper-arid conditions of the Atacama Desert. During the Neogene, a shift toward cooler global climates likely contributed to the long-term persistence of this extreme aridity. In this talk, we explore how micropalaeontological records can be used to reconstruct past oceanographic conditions within the Humboldt Current System. Using sedimentary archives from north-central Chile, we highlight how microfossils provide insights into the evolution of regional ocean properties and their links to climate and environmental change.

Prof. Dr. Patrick Grunert
Institute of Geology and Mineralogy
Micropalaeontology and Palaeoecology
University of Cologne
pgrunert@uni-koeln.de

Tiago Menezes Freire
Institute of Geology and Mineralogy
Micropalaeontology and Palaeoecology
University of Cologne
tiagomefreire@gmail.com