Preface
The first word begins with the name of God whose wise command on night,
day, sun, moon, and stars is the ground for deep changes and development
of all the creatures on the cosmos. Regarding the special geographical
situation and the precious natural sources, Caspian Sea has always been
the center of attention of many expansionist countries during the history.
Even in the ancient times since Achaemenid era to Sasanian, Safavid and
Qajar times, domination over the vast water area of this lake, use of its
living sources, and development of commercial activities was known as a
general necessity and systematic plan. By looking at the evolutionary
history of research on Caspian Sea from Peter the Great to The Tsarist
government and from the Soviet Union formation in at the first decade of
20
th
century and after its collapse in 1990 we realise that some indexes
were considered as the most important and influential factors in development
of various sciences in the Caspian sea region, including: The development
territory and military domination over the Caspian sea littoral of water area,
expansion and prosperity of trade exchanges between neighbouring
countries and Central Asia and Caucasus, increasing the productivity of
fisheries resources, extraction of Sodium Salt (Mirabilite), the exploitation
of subsurface resources(oil, gas, inorganic), energy transfer, water connection
between Caspian sea and other surrounding high seas, and the management
of water resources budget in the Caspian sea catchment area. Particularly,
during the last decades, when the Caspian Sea has been seriously polluted
by environmental hazardous pollutants, the attention of other developed
countries and global organisations was directed toward this region and it
was as a factor for growth and development of comprehensive applied
PREFACE
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