Paleoecological study Botswana-Namibia Raw sequence reads. freshwater sediment metagenome

Lake Liambezi on the border between Caprivi Strip, Namibia and Northern Botswana is fed by two major rivers. Linyanti River, which takes its source in Angola before to get diverted by the local geology due to the rifting of the region and to follow a fault under the name of Kwando River. It then takes part to Lake Liambezi formation as well as the second tributary called Zambezi River. After flowing mainly in Zambia, Zambezi River has a first separation that permit to a part of its water to flow directly to the lake through the Bukalo Channel. Downstream, a second separation due to a fault brings another part of water to the lake through the Chobe River. That Chobe River has the specific ability to flow in both direction depending on water discharge.Human activity in the lake area is still low and mostly traditional. Use of pesticides and other industrial pollutants might be low. However, according to a very fast industrial development and an important anthropic pressure in Zambia, this low impacted site might show an evolution on its geochemistry and microbial conditions.The present study aims to establish a diagnosis on present and close past geochemistry and microbiology of the lake’s sediment to establish a comparison reference for the coming changes. For this reason, three cores have been taken at three distinctive locations that might show different environmental conditions. As origin of water is from two distinctive environment, we might observe environmental differences in sediments.