Lake sediments are valuable records of the geological past. Particularly long-lived lakes are considered natural laboratories of evolution and are important sources for unraveling evolutionary mechanisms over long geological time intervals. Because of their prolonged existence they often accommodate rich and highly endemic and specialized faunas. Moreover, they afford the opportunity to study continental climate history and regional climatic events and thus increasingly draw the attention of paleoclimatologists. For this session we invite paleolimnological contributions on biodiversity, biogeography, ecology, stratigraphy, and climate.