Page 23 - CTB-1 10 May

PIONEERING A NEW FUTURE 23
MISSION
• Understanding origin and evolution of life through time.
• Understanding climate change in recent and deep geological times.
• Understanding past civilization and human history.
• Application of Palaeosciences to exploration programmes of oil and coal industry.
• Interpret plant-life evolution and geological processes involved and environmental evolution through time.
Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, Prime Minister of India, inaugurating BSIP
shifting ancestry of central and South Asian populations over time.
The tertiary megafloral, microfossil and vertebrate studies are an important base of BSIP’s advancement towards modern picture of climatic and environmental appraisals.
BSIP has also made major contribution towards other vertebrate fossils like elephants, rodents and bovids. Quantitative palaeoclimate estimates for the Indian subcontinent around the time of India-Asia collision are of considerable interest and work is being carried out by BSIP on early Eocene successions of palaeo-equatorial region of India in Eocene time.
Various analyses including Climate Leaf Analysis Multivariate Program (CLAMP) analysis are
being carried out on the fossil leaves recovered from various lignite successions of Palaeocene- Eocene time, as well as from mid-Miocene to
Early Pleistocene sediments. CLAMP analysis coupled with co-existence approach methodology can reliably reconstruct the Cenozoic climate quantitatively. Since the commencement of the institute there has been significant contribution towards the studies of Gondwana palaeobiodiversity.
Reconstruction of the vegetation through time involves observation and understanding of the distribution of plant remains belonging to various plant groups in different sedimentary facies of different formations. In this regard, diverse and multidisciplinary studies are being carried out from the Palaeozoic sequences of peninsular basins, as well as the Himalayan sequences of the Kashmir and Spiti basins.
To draw a comprehensive scenario of the vegetation dynamics and its palaeoenvironmental implications through Palaeozoic, rigorous analyses of newly collected data and material utilizing the state-of-the-art facilities, as well as contemporary approaches along with the synthesis of the gathered and published data from the various basins/ sub-basins/coalfields need to be put together and observed in the broader perspective. Keeping pace with the modern established facilities at BSIP,
with emphasis on interdisciplinary approach, palynofacies, isotopic studies and bio-marker analyses are being coupled with traditional macro- and miofloral studies. This conclusive approach