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Significant research progress has been made during the second year of this research grant.  Specifically, over 30 days of field work were conducted, six meeting presentations were given, and two papers were published related to niche modeling of fossil taxa.  Three additional abstracts have already been submitted for meetings during the second grant year.   Research expenses for one master’s student (Richard Malizia) were partially supported during the grant period.  The key research marks accomplished are listed in more detail below.

During the first part of this grant year, the primary research conducted was related to presenting and publishing results of the three MS theses by Nicole Dudei, Brad Walls, and Robert Swisher that were supported by the first year of the PRF funding.  In support of this goal, one oral and one poster presentation was presented by these students at the annual Geological Society Meeting in Portland, OR.  Following that, manuscripts were created from the thesis text of both Dudei and Walls.  To date, the Dudei paper has been published and the Walls paper is in press.

The focus of the grant research then shifted to identifying ways to improve the data quality generated from the three MS theses and determine innovative new ways to improve analysis of sedimentological data for niche modeling analysis. In order to improve analysis, a new modeling algorithm, Maxent , was applied to the paleontological data during this year’s work.  Initial tests of this program indicate that is very robust with modern biota, and we have recovered similarly robust results with our Ordovician data.  The initial Maxent analyses were presented at the International Brachiopod Congress in Melbourne, Australia and the International Palaeontological Congress in London, England.   Results of the analyses presented indicate that species respond to competition with interbasinal invaders by conserving the parameters of their environmental niche, an results of significance for predicting the impact of invasive species in modern ecosystems.

Extensive field work was conducted in the Cincinnati, Ohio region of southwest Ohio, southeast Indiana, and northern Kentucky during the spring and summer of 2010 with the aim of improving known weaknesses in the previously assembled data.  The primary goal of the field was to improve the datasets of sedimentological and species occurrence data collected during three MS thesis (students were supported during the first year of the PRF grant).   Over 30 field locations were investigated.  Cincinnatian strata of the C3, C4, and C5 sequences were previously subdivided into nine parasequences and correlated, so the new data could readily be placed within the appropriate stratigraphic context for niche modeling analysis.

Once the revised data was assembled, sedimentary data for 5 variables (inferred water depth, limestone bedding style, limestone bedding thickness, sedimentary structures, biofacies, and percent shale) were coded.  Contour maps of environmental distribution were constructed from this data.  The environmental data was paired with the species occurrence data set to model the ranges of articulate brachiopod species.  Analyses of this more refined dataset are currently underway and will be presented in one poster and one oral presentation at the upcoming Geological Society of America’s fall meeting in Denver, CO. 

Research during the final year of the grant period will focus on improving geographic range estimates from niche models of Cincinnatian brachiopods.  This project will involve additional weeks of field work in the winter of 2010.  Revision of theses into publishable papers will also continue.  A minimum of two additional manuscripts are expected to be submitted this year and two manuscripts in review are expected to be published in 2011.   Furthermore, presentations will be given at the Annual GSA meeting in Denver, CO and the International Biogeographic Society Meeting in Crete.