Objective
This project has four objectives:
1) Describe the terrestrial arthropod fauna of the Insect Bed, Isle of Wight, U.K.
This will be achieved by bringing together a team of fossil insect and arachnid experts, most of which reside in Russian institutions, to collect more material and study existing material in museum collections. There are many undescribed species (1000s?) residing in the collections and new ones are likely to be found in the field. Outputs from this will consist of papers to disseminate the descriptions of the overall fauna and new species.
2) Establish the age of the Insect Bed.
The exact age of the Insect Bed is not known. Further field work and detailed study by an expert stratigrapher will hopefully solve this problem. Output from this will consist of a paper.
3) Compare the Insect Bed fauna with other terrestrial faunas of a similar age.
Once the fauna is well known, it can be compared to other described faunas. This will highlight any biases in the fauna due to vagaries of sedimentary environment and taphonomy. Output from this will consist of a paper.
4) Interpret the terrestrial palaeoecology and palaeoclimate using the fauna and flora of the Insect Bed.
Knowing about the present day requirements of their nearest living relatives should elucidate the palaeoecology of the fauna and flora in the Insect Bed and indicate what the climate was like around 33.5 million years ago. Further comparison with other insect faunas should indicate how insect faunas have changed through a period of global cooling. Output from this will consist of a paper.
Topic(s)
Call for proposal
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LONDON
United Kingdom