Welcome

Welcome to the webpage of the 18th International Cave Bear Symposium (ICBS 2012).

Every year, the International Cave Bear Symposium gathers scientists worldwide to report their newest discoveries and researches in cave bear, as well as other large mammals discovered in caves and karst deposits.

In 2012, the ICBS will be organized in association with the International Workshop "Fossil remains in karst and their role in reconstructing Quaternary paleoclimate and paleoenvironments". While the ICBS is traditionally focused on cave bear, the workshop is intended to facilitate the participation of researchers from other areas of the Earth Sciences that may contribute to a better understanding of the stratigraphy of cave deposits, absolute and relative dating techniques, taphonomy of fossil assemblages and their significance for paleoclimatic and paleoenvironmental reconstructions.

Topics covered

As usually, during the 18th ICBS participants are welcomed to report their research on cave bears and other large mammals (e.g. cave hyaena, cave lion, etc.) discovered in cave or karst sites.

In addition, the International Workshop "Fossil remains in karst" is intended to foster the link between the "cave bear" community and scientists from other connected disciplines. We especially encourage oral presentations on the following topics:

- methods and techniques for direct dating of fossil remains;

- combined methods in dating stratigraphic profiles in caves;

- multi-proxy approaches for reconstructing past environments and climate oscillations from cave deposits;

- stable isotopes from fossil remains and applications in paleoenvironment reconstruction;

- aDNA techniques, progresses and limitations.

The workshop will preferentially include keynote-style presentations of which ~50% will be invited. A common poster session will be organized throughout the meeting.

We are looking forward to meet you in Romania in 2012!