The Ice Age

by Jürgen Ehlers, Philip Hughes, Philip L. Gibbard

This book provides a new look at the climatic history of the last 2.6 million years during the ice age, a time of extreme climatic fluctuations that have not yet ended. This period also coincides with important phases of human development from Neanderthals to modern humans, both of whom existed side by side during the last cold stage of the ice age. The ice age has seen dramatic expansions of glaciers and ice sheets, although this has been interspersed with relatively short warmer intervals like the one we live in today. The book focuses on the changing state of these glaciers and the effects of associated climate changes on a wide variety of environments (including mountains, rivers, deserts, oceans and seas) and also plants and animals. For example, at times the Sahara was green and colonized by humans, and Lake Chad covered 350,000 km2 - larger than the United Kingdom. What happened during the ice age can only be reconstructed from the traces that are left in the ground. The work of the geoscientist is similar to that of a detective who has to reconstruct the sequence of events from circumstantial evidence. The book draws on the specialisms and experience of the authors who are experts on the glacial history of the Earth.

Readership Undergraduate and postgraduate students studying the Quaternary, researchers, and anyone interested in climate change, environmental change and geology. The book provides a rich collection of illustrations and photographs to help the readers at all levels visualise the dramatic consequences of glacier expansions during the Ice Age.

560 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 10, 2015

About the author

Jürgen Ehlers studied Geography at the University of Hamburg. In 1978 he did his PhD with a study in glacial geomorphology. Since then Ehlers has been working at the Geological Survey of Hamburg, where he was in charge of the geological mapping. He has published numerous scientific articles and several textbooks in English including such titles as ‘The Morphodynamics of the Wadden Sea’ and ‘The Ice Age’.

In 1992 Jürgen Ehlers published his first crime story ‘Flucht’ (Escape). Since then numerous other short stories have come out in anthologies and journals. For his story ‘Weltspartag in Hamminkeln’ (World Savings Day in Hamminkeln) Ehlers was awarded the prestigious Friedrich Glauser Prize in 2005.

Jürgen Ehlers is a member of the ‘Syndikat’ and the ‘Crime Writers' Association’. He lives with his family in Witzeeze, near Hamburg.