Ilya Ulanov:

“The relevance of the project is due, on the one hand, to the insufficient knowledge on the issue, and on the other hand, to the threat of loss of the source base due to the destruction of objects of the early Iron Age – the Middle Ages associated with the erosive activity of the Angara reservoirs and the increased activity of treasure hunters and illegal excavators that are purposefully targeting metal objects of this period. Scientific novelty is determined by a new stage of research of the complexes of the early Iron Age – the early Middle Ages of the Southern Angara region. For the first time, an attempt is being made to cover all the previous results of episodic research on this topic and purposefully begin developing a thematic direction dedicated to the study of the complexes of the Early Iron Age – early Middle Ages of the Southern Angara region.”

Ksenia Vereshchagina:

“The planetary processes of global climate change, which have been actively observed in recent decades, are accompanied by an increase in climatic anomalies that pose significant risks to the planet's unique ecosystems. Among the climatic anomalies, more and more attention is being paid to the study of such a phenomenon as “heat waves”, which can have devastating consequences for aquatic ecosystems.

Very little is known about the effect of heat waves on communities of continental reservoirs and lakes, and almost nothing is known about the effect of heat waves on the unique inhabitants of ancient ecosystems. In particular, this problem concerns unique ancient freshwater ecosystems rich in diverse and endemic fauna, such as Lake Baikal. Extreme temperature phenomena in such ancient lake ecosystems can lead to irreversible loss of unique taxonomic or functional diversity, cascading impacts on ecosystems and serious disturbances in the structure and functions of ecosystems. The analysis of the data of monitoring observations of the ISU Research Institute of Biology also indicates that such events on Lake Baikal have become more frequent in the last decade.”