Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences

The scientific workers of the department carry out a wide research on paleogeography of the Quaternary. They research works on stratigraphy separate centuries of this period will be carried out, on the basis of restoration of fauna and a vegetative cover the change of a climate and having a place transgressions and regresses of Caspian Sea in this connection is studied. And also formation of glaciations in different centuries of Pleistocene happened on the Major and Minor Caucasus in connection with change of a climate.

Together with it wide researches of the most ancient site of the human in Azykh cave were carried out. It was established the first settling by human Azykh cave has taken place 1,8 million years back in Absheron century (Eopleistocene). In interglacial warming the preference was given to settling on open site on river terraces.

A chronostratigraphic scheme of Quaternary sediments of Azerbaijan was compiled as a result of comprehensive studies of Quaternary deposits of the Caspian Sea basin; the  correlationof Quaternary deposits was held with corresponding deposits of the Europe, Black Sea, Mediterranean Sea and Russian plain

For the first time, maps of Quaternary deposits of Azerbaijan have been compiled in scale M 1: 500000 and were included in the monograph “Geology of Quaternary sediments of Azerbaijan”. This work was awarded the State Prize of the Republic. Paleogeographic conditions of ancient human habitation were studied in the caves of Azykh, Taghlar and their surroundings.

Based on the faunal, paleomagnetic,tefrochronologicand paleotemperatural analysis data, a detailed radiometric scale was developed for Pliocene of South Caucasus.

Quaternary paleogeography was studied in terms of volcanism, geochemistry, organic world and together with the Institute of Geology compiled and published “Atlas of lithilogic-paleogeographic maps of Azerbaijan” on the scale of M 1:500000.

One of the great achievements is a publication of the two-volume “Atlas of lithilogic-paleogeographic maps of shelfs of Eurasia in Mesozoic and Cenozoic”, which included paleogeographic maps of the Caspian Sea shelfs.

The basic stages of the evolution of vegetation and climate in the Cenozoic in the Caucasus were identified.

The maps of vegetation in the scale of 1:2.500000 were compiled for separate chronological sections of Cenozoic, 8 of which were included in the National Atlas of Azerbaijan.