The Impact Crater Lake El’gygytgyn: Geomorphology and Quaternary Environmental History

The Lake El’gygytgyn basin, located in central Chukotka, Russian Arctic is an outstanding feature in surrouding landscapes and landforms. Many pecularities make this lake important for investigations. It occupies the only meteoritic crater on Earth that was formed in mostly acidic volcanic rocks, linking it with impact craters on Mars. The crater was formed 3.6 million years ago and since then never became affected by any kind of glaciers, thus leading to continuous sedimentation in the lake. Recently, Lake El’gygytgyn was the subject of an international ICDP drilling project that resulted in the recovery of the longest continuous palaeoclimatic and palaeoenvironmental record for the terrestrial Arctic covering the last 3.6 million years. The project included intensive geomorphological studies that helps, for example, to reconstruct Late Quaternary climate driven lake-level fluctuations.