Poster Number 193
See more from this Division: Topical Sessions
See more from this Session: Teaching with New Tools: Visualizations, Models, Online Data, Games, and More (Posters)
Abstract:
Students downloaded diversity data from the PBDB for Veneridae and Hippuritoida bivalves and plotted diversity curves in Excel to illustrate the rapid diversification of these bivalves and the timing of extinction of Hippuritoida. This portion of the lab reinforces concepts discussed in class such as the Cambrian explosion and extinction. Students then used the PBDB to plot distributions of bivalves for the Devonian, Cretaceous and Pleistocene and interpreted these distributions to be the result of the waxing and waning of epicontinental seas.
Animal migration was illustrated using ungulate and horse fossil distributions. For example, students were required to create maps that plotted the location of horse fossils in the Oligocene, Middle Miocene, Late Miocene, Pliocene, and Pleistocene. By doing so, students were able to constrain the timing of the formation of the Panama land bridge. This exercise reinforced the importance of the relationship between continental configuration and animal migration over geologic time scales.
A lab using the PBDB gives students exposure to databases, graph interpretation and excel spreadsheets. It also has the potential to serve as a capstone laboratory exercise that synthesizes important concepts in historical geology.
See more from this Division: Topical Sessions
See more from this Session: Teaching with New Tools: Visualizations, Models, Online Data, Games, and More (Posters)