by Matteo Cavallito<\/p>\n
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Affected by prolonged drought phenomena, forests in the Mediterranean<\/strong> area are likely to face desertification in the near future. An event described as “likely” according to the latest climate models<\/strong>. This was suggested by a research<\/a> carried out by a group of earth scientists from the University of Heidelberg<\/strong>, Germany. Researchers studied natural fluctuations in climate and vegetation over the past 500,000 years.<\/p>\n The study authors, led by researcher Andreas Koutsodendris<\/strong>, analyzed fossil pollen preserved in a sediment sample from Greece. In this way they tried to predict the consequences of human-caused climate change on ecosystems. The results of the investigation have been published in the journal Nature Communications.<\/p>\n