Angiosperm pollen grains in sedimentary profiles from two Brazilian Atlantic rainforests, northernmost coastal plain from Rio Grande do Sul, southern Brazil. Part II

Abstract

The state of Rio Grande do Sul (RS) is located in the extreme south of Brazil, within a transition region between the tropical and subtropical zones of South America that has been frequently affected by fluctuations in climate and vegetation over the last millennia. Palynomorphs preserved in sediments have provided excellent study material for paleoenvironmental reconstitutions of this region, as they reveal the source organisms and their respective environments over geological time. The present study was conducted to provide additional palynological reference material preserved in Quaternary sediments from the RS coastal plain for paleoenvironmental reconstruction studies. Here, we present taxonomic descriptions of pollen from 29 angiosperm taxa extracted along two Quaternary sedimentary profiles: the Pirataba forest profile (29° 15' S 49° 51'W) and the Faxinal forest profile (29° 21' S 49° 45' W), Torres municipality, in the extreme north of the coastal plain of RS. Ecological data and pollen photomicrographs accompany the taxonomic descriptions. This reference material, together with the other palynomorphs found in the two sedimentary profiles, was the basis for our study of paleoenvironments from the last millennia in southern Brazil, according to the dynamics of climate and vegetation.