Introduction
The Institute of Earth Environment (IEE) was founded as the Xi’an Research Laboratory of Loess and Quaternary Geology in 1985. It became part of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and assumed its current name in 1999. IEE scientists are engaged in understanding processes, patterns, trends and countermeasures related to climatic and environmental change on various spatiotemporal scales. Research areas include monsoon-dominated East Asian environmental evolution, abrupt climate change, cosmogenic nuclides and environmental tracer isotopes, dendroclimatology, atmospheric dust and black carbon, isotope geochemistry, and palaeo-climate dynamics, among others. Over the past decades, institute scientists have provided practical advice about sustainable socioeconomic development and ecological restoration, particularly in dryland areas of China, to Chinese governmental agencies at the central and provincial level. IEE aims to provide fundamental, strategic and prospective scientific support for promoting sustainable socioeconomic development in western China.
