Palynology

1. Fundamentals of Systematic Botany. The cycle of pteridophytes and spermatophytes. The reproductive organs of a spermatophyte;

2. Pollen, spores, and other palynomorphs (algal colonies, dynoflagellates). Microsporogenesis, morphology and identification of Angiosperm and Conifer pollen;

3. Pollen production, dispersal and sedimentation. Dispersal vehicles (wind, insects, water). Pollination, co-evolution pollen-insects. Form and function of the apertures, evolutionary trends. Honey: production and pollen analysis. Pollen calendars;

4. Types of deposits, soils and other materials preserving plant remains. Preservation of organic matter: waterlogging and carbonification, dessication, charring, mineralization. Natural deposits: peat, gyttja, carbonates and clastic lake sediments, speleothems, bone breccia, ice, etc. Anthropogenic deposits related to settlements and cults: pile-dwellings, embankments, latrine, wells, graves, rock shelters. Specific materials: resins, barks, coprolites, bones, tephra, human artifacts, forensic case studies;

5. Pollen analysis. Materials and methods: coring, collecting fresh pollen, preparation of a reference collection, laboratory treatments, pollen sum, pollen concentration;

6. Pollen diagrams. Preparation, interpretation and method of statistical elaboration (rarefaction analysis, CCA, correlograms);

7. Biostratigraphy and chronology. The concept of "natural archive": lakes, mires, wetlands and related sediments. Pollen stratigraphy: zonation; multistratigraphy;

8. Plant macroremains. Fruits and seeds, wood, charcoal and other vegetative remains. The use of plant macrofossils for Quaternary palaeoenvironmental reconstruction and radiocarbon dating;

9. Reconstruction of the palaeoenvironments and their variations. Pollen sources: local, extralocal, and regional sources; identification of a relevant source area for pollen. Palaeonvironmental reconstructions by transects and maps. Palaeoenvironmental changes and their causes (ecological, climatic and anthropogenic);

10. Quaternary vegetation history. Vegetation dynamics and glacial-interglacial cyclicity. Vegetation, climate and anthropic impact during the Late Pleistocene and the Holocene;

11. Archaeobotany. Anthropic activities: terms and examples. Classification of anthropogenic plants. Cereals and their subfossil remains. Archaeobotanical methods: microscopic charcoal analysis, plant content in coprolites and ceramic artefacts.

12. Charcoal as a proxy of fire

13. Pollen as a proxy of climate: theory and techniques to quantitatively reconstruct climate parameters based on fossil pollen spectra.