Palynology of Holocene Lake Baikal sediments

The Class@Baikal 2019 expedition led by UNESCO-Moscow State University Educational-Scientific Center for Marine Geology and Geophysics (the Department of Geology, Moscow State University Lomonosov) sailed several transects between the southern and central part of the Lake Baikal, Russia. Seismic profiles were made to map the lake bottom sediments and structures as well as several short piston cores were drilled. The drilling sites were located a) following a nearshore to offshore transect to study the sedimentary processes and b) in areas where mud volcanoes were located in the geophysical data. Intriguingly, the sediments retrieved from the cores contained a high amount of plant debris, such as wood and conifer needles. The present palynological study has been started with the goal to better understand the sedimentological processes resulting in these distinct horizons of plant fossil rich sediments. Another goal is to obtain a stratigraphic age for the mud clasts and the surrounding matrix sediments of the presumed mud volcano structures. The first sediment samples appear to be rich in pollen and spores which allows to establish a palynostratigraphic framework for the studied cores.