ADDRESSING ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES THROUGH FORAMINIFERA - CASE STUDIES FROM THE ARABIAN SEA

The present global scenario poses multiple environmental problems such as the green house effect, ozone holes, global warming a nd consequential sea level rise, all being attributed to anthropogenic contributions. Obviously, there is an increased awareness a bout the past and the present environment, so as to be able to foresee the future variability in climate. However, climate prediction is a very delic ate task and needs a thorough knowledge about the past. Past records have been maintained for not more than past 100-150 years, beyond which we woul d need proxies to give us information about the past climate. During the past few decades, microfossils, especially foraminifers have become the prime source to address environmental issues . Extreme sensitivity of foraminifera to changing environmental conditions have led to development of techniques to understand the past s ealevel fluctuations, monsoons, cyclones and storms, using their specific characteristics. The significant results thereby produced are also listed h ere. Besides being one of the most extensively used proxies for palaeoclimatic variations, foraminifers have also found applicability in marine -pollu tion and -archaeological studies. There exists both need and scope for further development of foraminiferal techniques useful in environment impact assessment. S o as to keep these techniques in sync with the changing modern trends, the traditional hard part studies of foraminifera need to be suppleme nted with a detailed