The thick loess deposits of China have provided rich and detailed insights into past environmental conditions in East Asia, enabling links to be made between climatic changes in continental Asia and marine sedimentary records through the Quaternary period. Until recently these eolian deposits were the primary paleoenvironmental archives from the region, but in the last decade or so great strides have been made in broadening the basis of paleoenvironmental reconstruction in the region. This has involved new analytical approaches to the study of loess, as well as an explosion of research into other natural archives—lake sediments, peat, ice, speleothems, and tree rings.

To review these developments, and to identify new opportunities for future research, a recent symposium on Environmental Processes of East Eurasia: Past, Present and Future brought together over 50 participants from eight countries.