Rike Zimmermann

Office Address

MARUM II
Office 3150
Leobener Straße
28359 Bremen
GERMANY

Postal Address

MARUM
University of Bremen
PO Box 330 440
28334 Bremen
GERMANY

Contents

• PhD thesis
• Publications
• Conference contributions
• Short CV
• Miscellaneous

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• Research interests
• Curriculum Vitae
• Further education

'Late Pleistocene and early Holocene development of buried valleys in the German Bight'

This PhD project is part of the Sediment Dynamics research area in the project SD1 'Formation and infill of Pleistocene buried tunnel valleys in the North Sea'. The Pleistocene (~2.6 Ma – 11.6 ka BP) was characterized by alternating phases of cold and warm conditions during which the North Sea basin was either dry land temporarily covered by ice during the glacial stages or inundated by marine transgressions in interglacial times. During glacials a huge amount of water is fixed in ice sheets. In the course of the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM, ~23-19 ka BP), for instance, global sea level was up to 130 m lower than today, leaving the shallow shelf of the North Sea basin dry land. With the amelioration of the climate and the subsequent deglaciation after the LGM another rise of sea level was initiated, eventually leading to the present day North Sea. Similar transgressions took place during earlier interglacials (i.e. the Eemian and Holsteinian) and remnants of those transgressive sequences have been preserved in the – now buried – tunnel valleys. Tunnel valleys are elongated depressions formed subglacially by melt water drainage and are important archives of Pleistocene and even Holocene material otherwise eroded in the North Sea basin.

The knowledge of the Holocene North Sea sea-level rise grows steadily and a lot of data has been published in recent years. However, the exact processes and timing, especially of the earliest postglacial transgression (prior to 8 ka cal BP) are not yet fully understood. The aim of this PhD project is thus to shed light on the Early Holocene sea-level rise using peat deposits from sediment cores offshore the German coast and to provide information for the interpretation of data of earlier interglacials to analyze and compare the development of the individual postglacial transgressions in the North Sea basin.


see also contributions for the SD1 homepage and the GLOMAR web teaser

in prep.

Zimmermann R, Feldmann S, Hepp DA, De Pol Holz R, Mörz T, Hebbeln D (in prep)
Early Holocene peat formation in the German Bight: A cautionary note on selecting offshore samples for reconstructions of postglacial sea-level change

2012

Zimmermann R et al.
Holocene peat deposits in the German Bight, southern North Sea – extending the reconstruction of the postglacial transgression seaward (Abstract), Quaternary International 279–280, 564 (http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2012.08.2097)

Zimmermann R, Feldmann S, Hepp DA, De Pol-Holz R, Mörz T, Hebbeln D (2012)
Early Holocene peat deposits in the German Bight: Selecting offshore sites for reconstructions of postglacial sea-level rise. International Conference of the GV & SEDIMENT 2012 'Of Land and Sea: Processes and Products', September 23-28, Hamburg, Germany (abstract)

Zimmermann R, Feldmann S, Hepp DA, De Pol-Holz R, Mörz T, Hebbeln D (2012)
O peat where art thou? Selecting offshore sites for reconstructions of postglacial sea-level rise. Bremen PhD Days in Marine Sciences, April 18-19, Etelsen, Germany (talk)

Zimmermann R, Feldmann S, Hepp DA, Mörz T, Hebbeln D (2011)
Holocene peat deposits in the German Bight - extending the reconstruction of the postglacial transgression seaward. XVIII INQUA Congress 'Quaternary Sciences - the view from the mountains', July 21-27, Bern, Switzerland (poster)

Zimmermann R, Feldmann S, Hepp DA, Mörz T, Hebbeln D (2011)
Jahrtausendlanges Wachstum frühholozäner Torfe in der Deutschen Bucht. Workshop 'Quartäre Rinnenstrukturen in der Deutschen Nordsee', May 11, Bremen, Germany (talk)

Zimmermann R, Feldmann S, Hepp DA, Mörz T, Hebbeln D (2011)
A drowned Holocene palaeo-river in the southern North Sea: sea-level rise induced infill history. Bremen PhD Days in Marine Sciences, April 13-14, Bremen, Germany (talk)

upcoming conferences

Substitute representative of the Department of Geosciences (FB5) for the 'PhD student committee' (Promovierenden-Kommission, advisory commission for funding decisions for graduate students) more...

Student at the Bremen International Graduate School of Marine Sciences (GLOMAR), Research area B: Coastal Zone Processes more...

Participant of the plan m Mentoring programme for women scientists in STEM 2012, Univ. Bremen more...