Morag Hunter

University of Cambridge | Cam · Department of Physics: Cavendish Laboratory

The expansion of copper mining on the hyper-arid pacific slope of Southern Peru has precipitated growing concern for scarce water resources in the region. Located in the headwaters of the Torata river, in the department of Moquegua, the Cuajone mine, owned by Southern Copper, provides a unique opportunity in a little-studied region to examine the r...

The expansion of copper mining on the hyper-arid pacific slope of southern Peru has precipitated growing concern for scarce water resources in the region. Located in the headwaters of the Torata river, in the department of Moquegua, the Cuajone mine, owned by Southern Copper, provides a unique opportunity, in a little-studied region, to examine the...

Accurate detection and quantification of regional vegetation trends are essential for understanding the dynamics of landscape ecology and vegetation distribution. We applied a comprehensive trend analysis to satellite data to describe geospatial changes in vegetation along the Pacific slope of Peru and northern Chile, from sea level to the continen...

Accurate detection and quantification of regional vegetation trends is essential for understanding the dynamics of landscape ecology and vegetation distribution. We applied a comprehensive trend analysis to satellite data to describe geo-spatial changes in vegetation along the Pacific slope of Peru and northern Chile, from sea level to the continen...

Avifauna from Rio Fortaleza, Peru

New Kingdom royal cult temples in Thebes (Luxor, Egypt) are all located on the lower desert edge. Kom el-Hettân (Amenhotep III: reign 1391-1353 BCE, 18th Dynasty) is an exception, as it is located in the present Nile floodplain. Its anomalous position has puzzled Egyptologists, as has the termination of its use, which traditionally has been attribu...

In the Theban area around modern Luxor (Egypt), the River Nile divides the temple complexes of Karnak and Luxor from New Kingdom royal cult temples on the western desert edge. Few sites have been archaeologically identified in the western flood plain, despite its presumed pivotal role in the ancient ritual landscape as the territory that both physi...

Report on the 2015 season of the Theban Harbours and Waterscapes Survey (THaWS). The paper discusses the extension of geoarchaeological and geophysical investigations to the east of the Ramesseurn, the continuing work in and around the Temple of Millions of Years of Amenhotep III, and the topographic survey and geophysical survey of the western mou...

Report on the 2014 season of the Theban Harbours and Waterscapes Survey. The paper discusses topographic survey and data correction for the West Bank of Thebes and geoarchaeological investigation of the Temple of Millions of Years of Amenhotep III and the area to the east of the Ramesseum.

The 2012 season in the Theban region ran from 15 February to 4 March and from 20 March to 7 April. The team consisted of the authors of this report, with Reis Omar Farouk managing the hand augering and our local team of workmen. Our MSA inspector was Ms Warda el-Najar.

Silicic volcanism at c. 168 Ma has been identified previously on the Antarctic Peninsula, and the Mapple Formation, which includes those volcanic rocks, has been defined and documented from one area of the east coast of Graham Land. Based on age and geochemical criteria, correlations have been made to the extensive Chon Aike Province of South Ameri...

We present the results of field investigations undertaken in Northern Palmer land during the 2008-09 field season, aimed at improving estimates of changes in the Antarctic Peninsula Ice Sheet volume since the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). This work represents the first attempt to constrain ice sheet behavior in the eastern sector of the Antarctic Pen...

Although smaller than it neighbors The Antarctic Peninsula Ice Sheet (APIS) is poorly constrained in terms its behavior during since the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). To the west of the APIS geophysical and oceanographic studies have demonstrated clear evidence of APIS expansion at the LGM, but to the east there are few constraints due to the presenc...

Geological analysis of 5–10-m-long sediment cores in the context of the anthropologically derived materials within them has allowed us to identify ancient landscape features in the Theban area around Luxor, Egypt. From these observations we propose a sequence of island formation and northwestward movement of the Nile from the Middle Kingdom onward...

The Jurassic Mount Poster Formation of eastern Ellsworth Land, southern Antarctic Peninsula, comprises silicic ignimbrites related to intracontinental rifting of Gondwana. The identification of less voluminous basaltic and sedimentary facies marginal to the silicic deposits has led to a reclassification of the volcanic units into the Ellsworth Land...

Recent detailed mapping, section logging and an improved understanding of the geological evolution of the Antarctic Peninsula provide a robust framework for an improved lithostratigraphic subdivision of the Latady Basin, eastern Ellsworth Land. Within the Latady Basin we recognize two main groups: Ellsworth Land Volcanic Group and Latady Group. The...

Dating Jurassic terrestrial floras in the Antarctic Peninsula has proved problematic and controversial. Here U–Pb series dating on detrital zircons from a conglomerate interbedded with fossil plant material provide a maximal depositional age of 144 ± 3 Ma for a presumed Jurassic flora. This is the first confirmed latest Jurassic-earliest Cretaceous...

The Jurassic Latady Basin (southern Antarctic Peninsula) developed in a broad rift zone associated with the early stages of Gondwana extension. Early Jurassic sedimentation (∼185Ma) occurred in small, isolated terrestrial to lacustrine rift basins in the present-day northwest and west and became shallow marine by the early Middle Jurassic. Quantita...

New collections of plant material from the Merrick and Sweeney Mountains provide further evidence of Jurassic floral diversity in the Antarctic Peninsula. Eighteen taxa are recognised, including sphenophytes (Equisetum), ferns (Cladophlebis, Sphenopteris, Coniopteris), Bennettitales (Otozamites, Zamites, Ptilophyllum, Dicytozamites, Williamsonia),...

New U–Pb zircon ion-microprobe ages from the alluvial conglomerates and flood plain sediments of the Botany Bay Group demonstrate that sedimentation occurred at c. 167 Ma, coeval with riftrelated silicic volcanism in the northern Antarctic Peninsula. In contrast, rift-related volcanism and sedimentation in the southern Antarctic Peninsula (Latady B...

Rhyolitic volcanism along the proto-Pacific margin of Gondwana occurred at intervals throughout the Jurassic. Silicic melt generation has been interpreted as a result of interaction between mantle plumes and subduction modified lower crust. The rhyolitic Mount Poster Formation of the southern Antarctic Peninsula is c. 184 Ma in age (V1), whereas si...

Silurian and lower Devonian sedimentary successions are uncommon within the remnants of Gondwana. The Port Stephens Formation, the basal unit of the middle Palaeozoic West Falkland Group, presents a rare opportunity to study Gondwanan material of Siluro-Devonian age. The formation on West Falkland is c. 2560m thick and consists of five members: Pla...

The Falkland Islands are one segment of the Permo-Triassic Gondwanian Fold Belt that was displaced during the fragmentation of Gondwana. Palæomagnetic, structural and palæocurrent data, reviewed in this paper, provide convincing evidence that the Falkland Islands rotated from an original position off southeast Africa to their present position off S...

The tectonic setting of the Archean Ngezi Group greenstones in the Belingwe Greenstone Belt, Zimbabwe, is controversial. Both autochthonous continental and oceanic settings have been proposed. The sedimentary facies of the basal Manjeri Formation have been logged in surface sections and in drill cores. Deposition occurred under fluviatile and shall...