The Sant'Anna site is located at the south-west suburb area of Oria (Brindisi province) in correspondence of the foot of a consolidated dune of the lower Pleistocene, which overlies upper Pliocene - lower Pleistocene biogenic detritic limestones and clayey-marls. The eolian deposit forms a some kilometres long watershed that strongly influences the landscape and the network of the streams. The site was settled during to distinct phases, namely the early middle Neolithic and the passage from the late Neolithic to the Copper Age. During the oldest phase (second half of VI millennium BC) at Sant'Anna were been manufactured raw materials, local or not, such as clays, stones, bones, hides and woods, to product objects intended to the whole southern Italy. Elegant painted and carved bowels as well as very good workmanship obsidian or chert blades had been found together with bone and polished stone tools. The lithic artifacts were classified on the strength of shape and presumed use in the following categories_ querns and (handstone) grinders, axes, hatchets, polishing stones, pestles, percussors and stone ornaments. These polished stone tools had been used for various manufactory activities such as the grinding of grain and the milling of the pigments (querns, grinders and pestles), the cutting and working of woods (axes and hatchets), the chipper of stones (percussors), and the treatment of vascular surfaces (polishing stones). During the second phase of settlement (second half of V millennium BC), Sant'Anna had been used presumably as residential site. Also in this period were found polished stone tools (querns, grinders and polishing stones). On the base of the lithological types, two groups of polished stone tools can be distinguish. The former consists of querns and (handstone) grinders made of calcarenites and calcirudites and, subordinately, sandstones. The artifacts of calcarenites and calcirudites had been made using the local upper Pliocene - lower Pleistocene marine deposits and especially the so called "carparo", whereas the sandstones used to made some grinders could coming from the adjacent Ionian - Bradanic area. All these rock materials are porous and relatively light. The tolls belonging to the second group consists of axes, hatchets, polishing stones, pestles, and percussors were mainly made of stones of allochthonous provenances, such as quarzites, quartz arenites, siliceous limestones, gabbros. An exception is a pestles referable to the middle Neolithic made of a limestone probably coming from Cretaceous beds cropping out not so far from Sant'Anna site. The majority of the types belonging to the second group are disc shaped, whereas some of which are flaky, and appear come from fluvial or littoral gravels. They are very hard and present excellent mechanical characteristics, which corroborate a hypothesis of elaborate selection of lithic materials practiced by the Neolithic peoples. To determine the provenance of the stones a number of areas source can be consider. First of all, the Basilicata region along which quarzites, siliceous limestones, jaspers and many other lithotypes are present within gravel deposits generated during the Pleistocene by the dismantling of the Apennine Chain. Nevertheless, about some tools, different origins must be examined. As an example, for an axe made of a metasomatized gabbros, the potential source areas of the Sila massif in northern Calabria and the coast of the Gargano promontory of the northern Apulia will be evaluated. Finally, a bead chain of crystalline calcite, (middle Neolithic), could be made with local karst cave accretion or sparite fractures filling.

Civil Protection is a major component of any society which must improve the level of safety and protection of its citizens. The role of the Research Institutions and especially the Competence Centre of the Civil Protection system of Italy, is to develop the activities about the hydrogeological damages and to guarantee a scientific consultation service of prediction and prevention of the calamitous events also during the emergencies. According to the Protection Civil Department database, Apulia is the fourth region in Italy affected by sinkholes, the greatest part of which due to collapse of mane-made cavities. The Salento peninsula, i.e. the southern part of the region, had hosted in the last twenty years at least fifteen events of sinkholes the last of which occurred at Gallipoli to start from 29 March 2007. The town of Gallipoli is located along the Ionian coast of the Lecce province, on a Quaternary succession which represent an international stratigraphic reference at least from the beginning of the XX century. The top of this succession is formed by calcarenitic units intensively quarried as building stone probably from ancient age. The extractive activities have made several wide underground quarries on which the town had been extended during the last decades. Voluntary associations, such as the Gruppo Speleologico Neretino, have mapped some underground quarries in the last twenty years. Some years ago, small and little damaging episodes of sinkholes were occurred but they did not consider enough to start an adequate vigilance system. The degree of event starts the 29 March had instead been so high to force the emptying of the house of more than one hundred peoples. As precursor signal, a sewage manhole was deformed and shifted. A first collapse had created a 12 x 18 m sinkhole, with the top of the cone shaped deposit deep about 3,5 m, which intersected the base of two 3 floors buildings. However, some adjacent constructions might been involved by a enlargement of the sinking. The observation of the fissure affecting the building revealed that a subsidence phenomenon had begum at least some months before the sinking. The underground area was explored together with the SAF Fireman Groups and the results were exposed to the Crisis Unit constitute to manage the first Civil Protection action. The state of incipient enlargement of the sinkhole as well as its unpredictable evolution were discussed. In particular, the widespread of calcarenites crevices due to opening of tectonic fractures, the presence of crushing fractures at the base of the columns holding the vaults of the quarries and the worrying thin thick of the quarries roof were showed. Against these evidences, filling operations of the sinkholes were decided after the Crisis Unit meeting. The 1 April 2007, during the laying of cement and stones, a further collapse had approximately triplicate the sinkhole crater area but fortunately it did not cause any victims. The experience of this disaster management can suggest some improvement of the Civil Protection Regulatory Frame. First of all, the safety and protection of the human life must be guaranteed not only for the resident peoples but also for every persons operating within the disaster scenarios, and especially the workers attending in emergency constructions that lacking of appropriate engineering projects. Furthermore the constructions achieved during the hydrogeological damage, made to attempt to limit the harms of building, could not impede further geological surveys that need to check safe carrying capacity and stability of the subsoil. Eventually, significant progress is possible if long-term action is engaged on the basis of broad cooperation. The advanced research can provide solid scientific and technical basis for regulation, the development of disaster prediction procedures, and the best possible management of the crisis situations.

Spunnulate consist of wide, not deep collapse dolines developed in carbonate rocks mainly of Quaternary age, related to the existence of caves usually with active speleogenetical hyperkarst processes. They occur along the coastal plains of the Apulia and especially of its south sub region, the Salento peninsula, where the term spunnulate derive from a dialectical verb (spunnare) which means_ to break, to sink. Each of this karst morphologies can be a potential geosite, whereas, as a whole, they constitute a geological heritage particularly vulnerable to the human activities and structures. At these karst sinkholes has been attributed the role of "ecological refuge" for numerous species of plants and animals, such as some stygobiont, peculiar hypogean invertebrates. Their morphological and idrological conformations have concurred the maintenance of different phytochoenosis, such as those typical of Mediterranean sclerophyllous. Moreover, spunnulate are object of hydrogeologic protection and belong to the safeguarded speleological patrimony from the Apulian Region. The aims of this research were to carry out_ the census of spunnulate present along Porto Cesareo and Nardò coastal plains (east Salento), the geomorfological and floristic features, the estimate of the human impact using the plants and the habitats as bioindicators following the hemeroby approach, an ecological tool introduced as an integrative measure for the impact on ecosystem and later extended to plant communities. All the data were integrated in a software GIS, as tools to support the knowledge useful to the fruition and the conservation of this geological heritage. Totally 117 karst features have mapped (66 of which are buried or destroyed spunnulate) and 252 species of plants have recognized. Dolines are usually arranged into group, according to the tectonic fracture systems, or form compound-synks of singular landscape value. The flora shows elements of remarkable interest from the phytogeographyc point of view and heterogenous habitat (Priority Habitats and Habitat of communitary Interest) and from Habitat of Regional Interest according to regional laws. The anthropic impact, analyzed through the hemeroby index, evidences how human activities and structures influence the floristic system and habitat. At present, such disturb is not yet push to the maximum level of distance and extraneity from the natural condition but is moderate in the greatest part of the examined cases. Anyway, the different estimates risks of alteration require various regimes of protection. The spunnulate offer opportunities for both environmental education and human impact study through changes in vegetative structure with time. Nevertheless, incorporating geology into conservation policies at the same level as biology is necessary. Therefore, operative action of geoconservation of this geological heritage must be adopted to preserve the geodiversity but need of integration into protected area management similar to that given to the bioconservation. To put it better, all natural processes must be considered together into a general strategy of oloconservation.

Recent epidemiological studies focused that the Salento people have an higher exposure to gastroenteritis in comparison to Italian population and the exposure to urinary bladder cancer is particularly high. This paper supports the hypothesis that the aforementioned health risks can be related to the present water resources management and urban pollution. The Salento peninsula, where Quaternary calcarenites and clays overlie Tertiary and Cretaceous carbonates, is characterized by karst morphologies. It hosts discontinuous shallow aquifers, locally used for irrigation, and a huge deep coastal karst aquifer intensively exploited for human purposes. Since the first settlements, landscapes were modified to drain the surface waters and discharge floods. The oldest wells excavated to draw groundwater go back even to the Bronze Age and testify archaic know-how about the water supplying. The Salento is presently crossed by a number of network of artificial and fluvial karst channels strongly modified owing to the urbanisation of territory. The main channels system, the Asso network, was joined to the Parlatano water sink and to other five minor karst sinks about 75 years ago, to solve the secular malaria scourge. To start from the 1991, this man-made fluvial-karst system have been used to discharge municipal and industrial wastewater from treatment plants. This use was encouraged by the necessity to restore the poor reserve of the deep aquifer. Actually, the terminal sinks of the Asso fluvial-karst system absolved the functions of_ storm water drainage wells, aquifer remediation-related wells and underground injection regulated wastewater disposal systems. Urbanisation profoundly affects groundwater recharge and groundwater quality and, as revealed a recent literature, the depth and the rate at which contamination penetrate urban aquifer remain poorly understood. Physic-chemical and bacteriological features of flowing water through the Parlatano water sink and groundwater drain by the Guardati hydraulic structure of Lecce were monitored during the last two years. At the same time, the tectono-stratigraphic arrangement of the sites was studied. About the Parlatano, the analysed waters presented high bacterial amount with Escherichia coli MPN/100 mL higher than the value established by law. High nitrate concentrations and significative nitrite and ammonia concentrations are also detected. A geological survey of the water sink, allowed the recognition of a fault dissecting the pre Quaternary substratum that can determine direct injections of wastewater in the deep aquifer. Concerning the waters sampled at the Guardati structure, variable amount of fecal pollution as well as nitrate concentration were measured. Occasionally, nitrites had detected too. Comparing this data with the rain heights recorded by the university meteorological station, a clear direct correlation is established. A pervasive network of kastified fractures inside the local Miocene calcarenites, recognized during the geological survey, allow fast infiltrations, namely in order of few hours or at most some days. So, the pollutants dispelled through sewer conduits can contaminated the groundwater also in occasion of usual rainfalls. To reduce the risks of the human health due to the high amount of organic pollutant systematically injected into the Salento aquifers, hypo-chlorination procedures of the water are ponderously realized. However, the impossibility of the total inactivation of some pathogenic virus by hypo-chlorination is largely exposed by a specific literature, whereas other researches stressed the elevate risk to urinary bladder cancer of the peoples drinking such treated waters. So, the water resources management is an hard task, being both the discharges into karst sinks and the escapes through sewers of wastewater, at enmity with the safeguard aquifers by pollutant displacements and the need to protect the public health.

Very few Cretaceous to Quaternary units cropping out along the Salento peninsula are formally defined or, at least, represented by proposed stratotype sections. Moreover, the literature of the local Pliocene and Pleistocene shows a number of stratigraphic schemes surprisingly high. Geological surveys performed through the southwestern Salento allow the recognition of some lithological facies (unformal units or stratigraphic levels) and the definitions of marker beds useful to correlate reduced and condensed successions. The facies are named_ chaotic assemblage; massive marlstones; glauconitic siltstones; phosphatized calcirudite; calcarenites and calcilutites. They are linked to Mediterranean paleo-environmental and paleo-climatological events and, as a whole, form a lower Pliocene - lower Pleistocene sequence overlies, in turn, by marine and terrestrial middle-upper Pleistocene deposits. Chaotic assemblage consists of megablocks, breccias and pebbles from older units in calcarenitic or calciruditic matrix (early Zanclean). It contains lens of limestone and is draped by the aforementioned marlstones and glauconitic siltstone (Zanclean-Piacenzian). In spite of the description of the chaotic assemblage was made about 130 years ago and a recent proposition of lihostratigraphic formalization of a representative section, its recognition appears again a questionable task. As an example, at Capo San Gregorio wide outcropping breccias is assigned by a recent literature to the above unit, notwithstanding they form intraclastic layers interbedded within a carbonate platform succession. Moreover, it also mentionable that east of Lecce a decimetric breccias is recognized, below a phosphatized pebbles in calcarenitic matrix level, in place of some tens metres thick of the so called "Leuca formation" recently mapped, and that such deposit cannot be considered a formation according to the stratigraphic codes. The phosphatized calcirudite (early Gelasian) locally (for example at Otranto) contains a number of squashed marly inclusions and shows a three-folded partition (reverse grain-size grading basal portion; middle one contains a dense detritus component; normal grain-size grading upper portion) which suggest intra-platform grain flow re-sedimentation processes. The phosphatization of the clasts probably developed below the euphotic zone, between the deepest inner shelf and the shallowest middle shelf. This marker bed is particularly suitable as a sequential stratigraphy tools and lets the correlation between a number of successions. The calcarenites and calcilutites (Gelasian-Calabrian) consist of fossiliferous intensively bioturbated coarse to fine-grained beds. This deposit can be related to the Calcarenite di Gravina Fm (Auct.). At the top it presents Arctica islandica which, in some place, form shell concentrations. The lowest stratum containing the northern guest allows the correlation between various successions. At least along the southwestern Salento, Pliocene is not formed by two sedimentary cycles as reported in literature. The chaotic assemblage represents the Transgressive System Tract relative to the fast early Mediterranean Pliocene sea level rise; marlstones and glauconitic siltstones are the condensed deposits linking the maximum flood surface, whereas the overlying erosional surface represents an unconformity marking a gap in the sequence. Finally, calcarenites and calcilutites constitute the High Stand Tract relative to the sea level dropping. Especially along the central and western sectors of the Salento, lower Pleistocene calcarenites and calcilutites are overlie by a sandy deposit rich in mollusc and brachiopoda, especially Terebratula scillae, that forms an umpteenth marker bed.

Several marine terraces are reported in the Southern Apulia literature, although their number and age are differently interpreted by the Authors. As well know marine terraces, and best their inner margin, allow the identification of paleo-shorelines with variable degrees of uncertainty. Until the Seventies, the higher Apulia uplift coastline were referred to Pliocene, instead currently all the reconstructed paleo-shorelines are assigned to the Pleistocene. This study deals with the paleontological features of some south Apulia deposits having reference to pre-Tyrrhenian sea level stands. Stratigraphic, tectonic and morphological aspects are discussed, too. At about 190 m asl, above Agnano Cave (Ostuni), a slightly cemented volcaniclastic-biogenic-terrigenous deposit filles karstified fractures of Cretaceous limestone. Together with rhyolitic pumices, calcium sulphate-carbonate nodules, paleo-soil residual clay chips and other clasts, a large amount of gastropods and bivalves shells are present, a number of which are suitable to reconstruct paleo-ecological features. Well preserved Melaraphe neritoides, a Littorinidae typical of the Eulittoral zone and several species belong to Turbinidae, Trochidae, Rissoidae and Cerithiidae, characteristics of presently Posidonia mattes, have been identified. Moreover, very abundant are the juvenile specimens. As a consequence, this deposit appears a reliable sea level indicator. Unlike the macro fossils content of the south Apulia marine terraces are usually poorly preserved and don't allow to acquire careful paleo-environmental knowledge. It can be considered the neighbourhood of Montemesola, where the calcarenites at the top of local Quaternary succession are referred to distinct marine terraces and considered key-level to the study of the Apulia Quaternary sea level stands. In any case, their macro fauna contents can be only generically referred to shallow sea environment. Moreover, geological survey carries out that the top calcarenites, cropping out south east of Montemesola between 190 and 130 m asl, are faulted and frequently involved within landslides which could have made overestimate the number of the terraces described in literature. The southern Apulia terraces are suitable to sedimentological analyses rather than paleontological studies, such as the Mazzucchi deposits (Parabita), which cover a wide terraced landscape comprised between the inner margin at about 145 m asl, coincident with a fault involving the Cretaceous substratum, and the outer margin at 125 m asl. At present fossils are not found and the deposit appears as a transgressive systems tract. To perplex the sea level stands reconstruction of the south Apulia contribute also some generic stratigraphic correlation. Signorella district (Cutrofiano) example can be examined. It is part of wide area where a recent literature consider the top of the local succession as marine terraces in disagreement with the Geological map of Italy at the scale 1 at 100000, that refers it to the sandy informal member of the "Gallipoli Fm" which, in turn, belongs to the Argille Azzurre group. Here, vulcaniclastic and continental deposits (calcretes, reddish sands, brown pelites) overly the aforementioned informal unit, whereas below its base occurs a metric level of ochre sands containing shell concentrations of Terebratula scillae and Arctica islandica among a number of molluscs and gastropods. Some specimens of Misticeta occur below the base. Such level can be related to the so called "sabbie a brachiopodi" unit, indicates in literature by a possible marine terrace deposited. Taphonomic compositions, biofabric, geometry and stratigraphic-sedimentological features of the concentrations suggest optimal ecological conditions and subordinate hydrodinamic processes. Moreover, some recognized ecological key-species are typical of subtidal muds biocenosis and presently characterize the external zone of the Apulian shelf.