During the late Quaternary, in the temperate zone of the northern hemisphere, the cyclical alternation of erosional and depositional processes was the dominant response of the fluvial systems to climate change. Fluvial processes interchanged as a function of orbital, eccentricity-driven climate cycles to generate - favored by regional tectonic uplift - typical staircases of staked fill terraces. Only few studies focused on quantifying the response of fluvial processes to low magnitude, short-term climate variability during the last glacial-interglacial cycle. This project deals with the exploration of the geomorphic response of the fluvial systems to the short-term climate variability, combining both process-based and historical geomorphological approaches. The northern Apennines offer a unique opportunity for answering this scientific question because preserves well-developed fluvial terraces, from late Pleistocene up to Holocene in age, due to repeated cut and fill episodes that interchanged during the last 75 ka. Traditional field survey, remote sensing, quantitative land surface analysis and landscape evolution modelling are planned along some key river valleys draining the northern Apennines (43°- 44° N). Specific goals are: 1) description of the main terrace depositional phases, absolute geochronological collocation and along-valley morpho-stratigraphic correlations; 2) description of types and rates of the post-glacial valley entrenchment; 3) discrimination of the components due to climate, active tectonics and landslide erosion in the terrace generation; 4) identification of the regional-to-global correspondence of the recognized morpho-evolutionary steps with the acknowledged climate events within the Mediterranean area. Results are expected to contribute to the knowledge on the geomorphic response to climate change, enhancing the understanding about the role of global warming on the future waterscape transformations at the mid latitude.
