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Virtual Tour of Past Environmental and Climate Change: the Messinian Succession of the Tertiary Piedmont Basin (Italy)

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Abstract

The multidisciplinary research project ‘PROGEO-Piemonte’ aims to achieve a new conceptual and operational discipline in the management of the geological heritage of the Piemonte region (NW Italy). One of the nine strategic geothematic areas of the project addresses a controversial scientific theme, that of climate and environmental change, by analysing the record of the Messinian salinity crisis in Piemonte. This palaeoceanographic event, which occurred about 6 Ma ago during the late Messinian, was characterised by dramatic palaeobiological, palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimatic changes that affected the entire Mediterranean area. In the Piemonte region, Messinian rocks outcrop in the Tertiary Piedmont Basin; they record the three stages of the Messinian salinity crisis and the correlative environmental and climate changes. We propose to the general public a virtual geological tour of the main outcrops showing the evolution of this event to be hosted on the PROGEO-Piemonte website and accessible via mobile devices on-site or at home. The web-based digital tour will cover several geosites where the main steps of the Messinian salinity crisis are best recorded; it will integrate on-site information available through panels along with web-accessible complementary information; moreover, it will allow the virtual visit to remote or restricted sites (e.g. active quarries) in a digital environment. The focus on environmental and climate changes that occurred during the Messinian salinity crisis will improve public knowledge and awareness of environmental modification and past climate variability and will address whether such changes could happen again in the future.

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Acknowledgments

This research is part of the PROGEO-Piemonte Project funded by the University of Torino together with the Compagnia di San Paolo (project number ORTO11Y7HR). Giuseppe Mastronuzzi, Kevin Page and an anonymous reviewer are thanked for their constructive review of the paper. Tim K. Lowenstein is greatly acknowledged for the revision of the English text.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra, Università di Torino, Via Valperga Caluso, 35, 10125, Turin, Italy

    Francesca Lozar, Pierangelo Clari, Francesco Dela Pierre, Marcello Natalicchio, Elisa Bernardi, Donata Violanti, Emanuele Costa & Marco Giardino

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  1. Francesca Lozar
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  2. Pierangelo Clari
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  3. Francesco Dela Pierre
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  4. Marcello Natalicchio
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  5. Elisa Bernardi
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  6. Donata Violanti
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  7. Emanuele Costa
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  8. Marco Giardino
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Correspondence to Francesca Lozar.

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Lozar, F., Clari, P., Dela Pierre, F. et al. Virtual Tour of Past Environmental and Climate Change: the Messinian Succession of the Tertiary Piedmont Basin (Italy). Geoheritage 7, 47–56 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12371-014-0098-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12371-014-0098-8

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