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The volume is part of World Geomorphological Landscapes series and shows characteristic landscapes and landforms of Poland. It consists of two parts, general and regional. The first part includes overviews of geological history, Quaternary, climate and its impact on landforms, geomorphological division of the country, geoheritage and geoconservation. The second part comprises more nearly 40 region-specific studies to show the diversity of landscapes, from high-mountain relief through medium-altitude forested ranges, limestone uplands and loess plateaus, lowland landscapes moulded by past ice sheets, rivers and aeolian processes, to coastal sceneries. Selected examples of anthropogenically modified landscapes are also considered. Each chapter is accompanied by photographs, maps and diagrams. The volume is intended primarily for geographers and Quaternary geologists, but will be also of interest to anyone interested in natural landscapes and their conservation.

Taking a new global approach, this unique book provides an updated review of the geology of Iberia and its continental margins from a geodynamic perspective. Owing to its location close to successive plate margins, Iberia has played a pivotal role in the geodynamic evolution of the Gondwanan, Rheic, Pangea, Tethys s.l. and Eurasian plates over the last 600 Ma of Earth's history. The geological record starts with the amalgamation of Gondwana in the Neoproterozoic succeeded by the rifting and spreading of the Rheic ocean; its demise, which led to the amalgamation of Pangea in the late Paleozoic; the rifting and spreading of several arms of the Neotethys ocean in the Mesozoic Era and their ongoing closure, which was responsible for the Alpine orogeny. The significant advances in the last 20 years have attracted international research interest in the geology of the Iberian Peninsula. This volume presents the most comprehensive, careful and updated description of the variscan cycle in Iberia. This volume focuses in the different geological events since the Cambrian-Early Ordovician rift until the late variscan orocline formations including magmatic and metamorphic evolution.

During the 2nd International Symposium on Fossil Algae, organized by the University P. & M. Curie, Paris, in April 1979, a special session was devoted to stromatolites; 29 papers were presented in French, English, or Russian. Among the papers selected originally, 16 were carried out to the final stage by their authors. They are presented here in their stratigraphical order. This selection does not pretend to cover the problem of Phanerozoic stromatolites in its entirety, but relates case histories. This should be the seed for further books analyzing and illus­ trating the paleoecology, the niche and the features of Phanerozoic stromatolites, namely throughout the Mesozoic and the Paleozoic, where the data are still scarce; this will lead to naturalistic views on the evolutionary features of Post Riphean stromes, and will sharpen tools to interpret their Precambrian ancestors. Let me introduce the papers. CLAUDE L. V. MONTY formalizes two basic types of crypt algal micro­ structures: the spongiostromate and the porostromate microstructures respectively; the rise of the latter around the Precambrian/Cambrian boundary represents a very significant step in the evolution of cyano­ bacterial microstructures and in their interaction with the environment. K. K. VERMA and G. BARMAN present a lower Phanerozoic stroma­ tolitic assemblage from Rajasthan associated with paralic alluvial fans fed by block faulting. Main stromatolite developments occurred during periods of low sedimentation and negligable tectonics, and formed in very shallow marine water. J.

Sedimentary basins host, among others, most of our energy and fresh-water resources: they can be regarded as large geo-reactors in which many physical and chemical processes interact. Their complexity can only be well understood in well-organized interdisciplinary co-operations. This book documents how researchers from different geo-scientific disciplines have jointly analysed the structural, thermal, and sedimentary evolution as well as fluid dynamics of a complex sedimentary basin system which has experienced a variety of activation and reactivation impulses as well as intense salt tectonics. In this book we have summarized our geological, geophysical and geochemical understanding of some of the most important processes affecting sedimentary basins in general and our view on the evolution of one of the largest, best explored and most complex continental sedimentary basins on Earth: The Central European Basin System.

The monograph offers a comprehensive discussion of the role of evaporites in hydrocarbon generation and trapping. For the first time, diverse knowledge on exploitable salts has been assembled and organized, along with a summary of evaporate karst hazards as well as a summary of exploitative methods and pitfalls in dealing with evaporites in conventional and solution mining. Written by a field specialist in research and exploration, the book presents a comprehensive synthesis of the low temperature realm of evaporite evolution. It is aimed for earth science professionals, sedimentologists, oil and gas explorers, mining geologists, as well as environmental geologists.