Ellyn J. Cook,^1,2,*,** Bas van Geel,^2,*** Sander van der Kaars,^1,2,**** Jan van Arkel<sup>2,*****

1</sup>aSchool of Geography and Environmental Science, PO Box HA, Monash University, Victoria 3800, Austral
²bInstitute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics, University of Amsterdam, Science Park 904, 1098

^*Corresponding author. Email: ellyn.cook@ymail.com
^**ELLYN J. COOK completed a BA Hons in soil science then a PhD in Quaternary palynology at Monash University in Australia, in which she explored lunette-lake basins as sensitive recorders of environmental change. Together with Sander van der Kaars, she developed the first pollen-climate transfer functions for use in Australia. Work in the INQUA ‘PALCOMM’ project focused on the southern continents and oceans led to publishing on glacial and deglacial climatic patterns in the Australasian region. Her interests include investigating patterns of interglacial—glacial change and megafaunal extinction.
^***BAS VAN GEEL is Senior Lecturer in palaeoecology and palaeoclimatology at the University of Amsterdam. During the last 40 years he has focused on high resolution Late Quaternary palynological studies of lake deposits, fens, bogs and archaeological sites. He leads research into C wiggle-match dating of organic deposits and understanding solar forcing as a factor in climate change as well as climatic teleconnections. In the course of his palynological studies, he pioneered investigation of the value of non-pollen palynomorphs, especially in combination with macrofossil analysis. During his work he has documented hundreds of such ‘Types’. Recently, he has applied these techniques to ecological studies of mammoths and mastodons in Siberia and North America.
^****SANDER VAN DER KAARS has worked on sites on each of the continents as well as marine cores from North America, Europe, Asia and Australia, ranging in age from the Cretaceous to historical times. After a Bachelors degree in Geology at the University of Amsterdam, he moved to the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam to work on the floral turnover at the K-T boundary in Montana, Lower Tertiary coal deposits from Colombia and the Neogene palynology of DSDP site 603 in the NW Atlantic for a Masters in Geology. He returned to the University of Amsterdam to undertake a Ph.D. in Quaternary palynology of the Indo-Australian region using material from the Indo-Dutch Snellius-II expedition. After studying sites in Morocco, west Java, central Italy and the Adriatic, he moved to Monash University and specialised in the Quaternary history of the Indonesian-Australasian region using marine as well as terrestrial cores. He has produced over 50 records from the region and has been engaged in debates over environmental change and the arrival of people in Australia, as well as investigating the effects of the Toba super-eruption.
^*****JAN VAN ARKEL is a scientific photographer and digital illustrator at the Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics at the University of Amsterdam. He has always been interested in the nexus between art and nature and studied monumental design at the Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam, which he has used to help him develop his skills in documenting nature in pictures. Jan has worked across a range of scientific subjects, from cataloging butterflies and phytoplankton in zoology to illustrating the botanical remains found in the intestines of mammoths.