Overview
- Examines the role of trace fossils, fossil leaves and paleosols in paleoclimate and paleoecological reconstruction
- Demonstrates special techniques such as geometric morphometrics, isotope analysis of biominerals, and analysis of dental tissue to understand past climate and environmental conditions
- Reviews exhaustively the key recent research in organismal approaches used to reconstruct Cenozoic ecosystems
Part of the book series: Vertebrate Paleobiology and Paleoanthropology (VERT)
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Table of contents (18 chapters)
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Front Matter
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Back Matter
Keywords
- reconstructing cenozoic terrestrial environments
- trace fossils in paleoenvironmental reconstructions
- ecomorphology
- paleoecological reconstruction
- phytolith analysis in deep time
- function of postcranial skeleton
- body mass reconstruction in fossils
- dental mesowear and microwear analysis
- 3D orphometrics in paleoecology
- isotopes from biominerals
- quantitative geology
About this book
This volume focuses on the reconstruction of past ecosystems and provides a comprehensive review of current techniques and their application in exemplar studies. The 18 chapters address a wide variety of topics that span vertebrate paleobiology and paleoecology (body mass, postcranial functional morphology, evolutionary dental morphology, microwear and mesowear, ecomorphology, mammal community structure analysis), contextual paleoenvironmental studies (paleosols and sedimentology, ichnofossils, pollen, phytoliths, plant macrofossils), and special techniques (bone microstructure, biomineral isotopes, inorganic isotopes, 3-D morphometrics, and ecometric modeling). A final chapter discusses how to integrate results of these studies with taphonomic data in order to more accurately characterize an ancient ecosystem.
Current investigators, advanced undergraduates, and graduate students interested in the field of paleoecology will find this book immensely useful. The length and structure of the volume also makes it suitable for teaching a college-level course on reconstructing Cenozoic ecosystems.Editors and Affiliations
About the editors
Dr. Scott Simpson is an Associate Professor in the Department of Anatomy at the Case School of Medicine in Cleveland, Ohio.
Dr. Denise F. Su is the Curator and Head of Paleobotany and Paleoecology at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: Methods in Paleoecology
Book Subtitle: Reconstructing Cenozoic Terrestrial Environments and Ecological Communities
Editors: Darin A. Croft, Denise F. Su, Scott W. Simpson
Series Title: Vertebrate Paleobiology and Paleoanthropology
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94265-0
Publisher: Springer Cham
eBook Packages: Earth and Environmental Science, Earth and Environmental Science (R0)
Copyright Information: Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2018
Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-319-94264-3Published: 13 November 2018
eBook ISBN: 978-3-319-94265-0Published: 27 October 2018
Series ISSN: 1877-9077
Series E-ISSN: 1877-9085
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: XVI, 410
Number of Illustrations: 53 b/w illustrations, 51 illustrations in colour
Topics: Paleontology, Archaeology, Animal Anatomy / Morphology / Histology, Terrestial Ecology, Geoecology/Natural Processes, Quantitative Geology