The geological information, obtained through traditional palaeontological, sedimentological and geochemical techniques, is often taken at face value. There is little doubt, that there is valuable information about evolutionary history, past biodiversity, ecology, biogeochemical cycles, climate and environmental change is enclosed in the sedimentary rock record. However, preservation, diagenesis, erosion, sea-level changes, sampling strategies, and analytical approaches can distort this information and introduce biases in the reconstructions of past Earth processes. This problem has gained wider recognition with respect to palaeontological patterns, particularly in the field of stratigraphic palaeobiology addressing the impact of the sequence-stratigraphic architecture on fossil data, as well geochemical proxy records. For example, diagenetic trajectories specific to certain lithologies can dictate stratigraphic patterns in stable and radiogenic isotope as well as (trace) elemental composition. Hence, quantitative approaches that correct for these artifacts in palaeontological, sedimentological and geochemical time series might share many commonalities. We herein highlight novel developments, which can greatly contribute to a more holistic understanding of the earth system. Examples range from the Paleozoic up to the Holocene.

This is a short description of how we will handle our session chat. We have allocated at least 4 minutes of time to discuss individual contributions after a brief introduction (5 minutes). We will finish our session with an open discussion (min. 25 min) allowing for more questions for individual talks (if necessary) as well as more general remarks on topics related with our session.