Geoscientific Research in Northeast Africa - 1993

Geological, Geophysics, Environmental & Geotechical Engineering

Thorweihe and Schandelmeier reported in 1993 on the PROCEEDINGS OF THE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON GEOSCIENTIFIC
RESEARCH IN NORTHEAST AFRICA / BERLIN / GERMANY / 17-19 JUNE 1993.

The idea to organize an international conference on ‘Geoscientific Research in Northeast Africa’ was suggested by a number of scientists during the last years. Staff members of the ‘Special Research Project Arid and Semi-Arid Areas’ (SFB 69) of the Technical University of Berlin, one of the biggest research projects engaged in Northeastern African geology, have responded to the proposals by organizing a conference from June 17th to the 19th 1993 in Berlin.
Information on a compilation of extended abstracts was distributed to some 500 individuals, resulting in more than 100, mostly co-authored contributions at the end of February 1993.

The Organizing Committee decided that this abstract volume, although initiated in connection with the Berlin conference, should also be open to
non-participants of the meeting. The production of this volume in a few months was a difficult task, because many of the papers arrived late, rendering the application of a normal review process impossible. Many texts had to be reformatted and some had to be retyped and corrected for English. However, it was often not possible to send the modified texts to authors from countries, where the mail service is slow.

The contributions to this volume are generally closely oriented along the thematic lines of the conference, thus providing a large amount of new data and
information on the topics of crustal accretion, intraplate dynamics, paleoclimate and hydrology. The extended abstracts, although certainly not a substitute for a comprehensive publication, nevertheless offered the opportunity for many researchers to quickly spread new ideas and results of on-going research in Northeast Africa in a condensed form.

We like to thank the publishing house Balkema for its cooperation and for the extremely favourable financial conditions, which facilitated this fast distribution of geoscientific information. We also like to thank G. Banks and A. Sama from the secretarial office of SFB 69 for their technical assistance prior to printing.