EarthCube Data Capabilities: Solutions for Paleobotany: a web client hosting novel content and its integration with existing databases

EarthCube 数据功能：古植物学解决方案：托管新颖内容及其与现有数据库的集成的 Web 客户端

• 批准号: 2026961
• 负责人: Ellen Currano
• 金额: $ 120万
• 依托单位: University of Wyoming
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-09-01 至 2024-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2026961&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: EarthCube; Data; Capabilities; Solutions; Paleobotany

Fossil plants provide the best record of how Earth’s environments have changed through time. However, plant fossils present unique challenges that previously made this record inaccessible for large scale studies of Earth History. Plant organs, like leaves, wood, fruits, seeds are rarely preserved attached to each other, and it can be difficult to associate different organs as part of the same plant and assign formal taxonomic names to the isolated organs. None of the major paleontological databases can accommodate the informal names that are commonly used for isolated organs, and the necessary tools to coordinate such fossil plant data across institutions, researchers, time periods, and geography do not exist. This project will create the integrative Paleobotany Database (PBOT), an online public database of fossil plant descriptions for both informally and formally-named fossils, work-bench software, and community discussion forums. PBOT will integrate with existing online database resources, including museum specimen and occurrence records, to enable research on past plant diversity and evolution at scales not previously possible. PBOT will advance NSF’s mission of transparency in science, by making paleobotanical data and the scientific process more open and accessible to a broad range of users. For example, the database will make fossil plant data available to the public and educators at all levels for use in hands-on educational activities and for citizen science initiatives. Furthermore, the online workbench will provide a standardized resource for fossil plant description and data entry that will benefit students and professionals, as well as fossil enthusiasts. Overall, the PBOT infrastructure and platform will revolutionize the way paleobotanical data is shared and used, allowing for a myriad of scientific and societal uses, and charting a sustainable, long-term digital future for paleobotanical data management and research.Paleobotanical data is severely underrepresented in major publicly accessible databases, even though fossil plants represent the best record of ancient terrestrial environments. A major impediment to the inclusion of paleobotanical data in databases at meaningful levels of taxonomy is that plant parts are most often preserved separately, with varying potential for taxonomic resolution. Paleobotanists therefore commonly use morphologically-based, informal taxonomies (morphotypes) rather than traditional Linnaean classifications. The names given to a particular morphotype are inconsistent among research groups, and currently there is no data-management infrastructure that allows comparison and synonymizing of morphotypes among regions or time periods or with published formal taxonomies. As a result, a large proportion of the millions of fossil plant specimens housed in museums worldwide are, together with their spatio-temporal occurrence data, inaccessible for inclusion in studies of paleobiology, paleoclimatology, Earth system modeling, macroevolution, and macroecology. This project will provide a long-needed solution to these problems by extending the Paleobiology Database (PBDB) with a Paleobotany Portal (PBOT) web client and database for (1) creating novel, dynamic, community-sourced character schemas for morphotypic plant descriptions; (2) entering and browsing informal and formal taxonomies via morphological characters; (3) applying these formal and informal taxonomies to digitized fossil plant specimens in Integrated Digitized Biocollections (iDigBio); and (4) maintaining a community forum for expert commentary on PBOT contents. As a part of this project, the researchers will use PBOT to populate PBDB with paleobotanical leaf fossil datasets from the Cretaceous through Eocene and analyze diversity and climate variation across the warmest intervals of the past 100 million years. Overall, data made available by PBOT will enable synthetic analyses of paleoclimate and plant macro-ecology and -evolution that have not been possible to date.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

化石植物提供了地球环境如何随着时间变化的最佳记录。然而，植物化石提出了独特的挑战，以前使这一记录无法访问地球历史的大规模研究。植物器官，例如叶子，木材，水果，种子很少被固定在彼此的附着，并且很难将不同的器官作为同一植物的一部分关联，并将形式的分类学名称分配给孤立的组织。没有一个主要的古生物学数据库可以容纳通常用于孤立器官的非正式名称，并且不存在跨机构，研究人员，时间段和地理位置协调这种化石植物数据的必要工具。该项目将创建集成的古植物数据库（PBOT），这是一个在线公共数据库，用于非正式和正式命名化石，工作基础软件和社区讨论论坛的化石植物描述。 PBOT将与现有的在线数据库资源（包括博物馆标本和事件记录）集成，以使以前无法进行的植物多样性和进化进行研究。 PBOT将通过使古植物学数据和科学过程更加开放和访问大量用户来提高NSF在科学领域的透明度。例如，该数据库将使化石植物的数据可供公众和各级教育工作者使用，以便在动手教育活动和公民科学计划中使用。此外，在线工作台将为化石植物的描述和数据输入提供标准化资源，以使学生和专业人士以及化石爱好者受益。总体而言，PBOT基础架构和平台将彻底改变古植物数据的共享和使用方式，从而允许无数的科学和社会用途，并为古植物学数据管理和研究绘制可持续的，长期的数字未来。多核心数据在主要公开访问的数据库中占据了极大的公开记录，即使在较大的远古时代，paleobotanical数据却非常不足。在有意义的分类学水平上包含古植物数据的主要障碍是，植物部分通常是单独保留的，具有分类法分辨率的潜力各不相同。因此，多核心主义者通常使用基于形态学的，非正式的非正式分类法（形态型），而不是传统的Lilnaeaneansivations。在研究小组中给出的特定形态的名称是不一致的，目前尚无数据管理基础架构可以比较和同义区域或时间段或时间段或已发表的正式分类法。结果，在全球博物馆中存放的数百万化石植物标本中，很大一部分是它们的时空出现数据，无法纳入古生物学，古气象学，地球系统建模，宏观进化和宏观生态学研究。该项目将通过使用古生物生物学数据库（PBDB）使用古植物学门户（PBOT）Web客户端（PBDB）和数据库来为这些问题提供长期的解决方案，以（1）为形态型植物描述创建新颖的，动态的，社区的特征模式； （2）通过形态特征进入并浏览非正式和形式分类法； （3）将这些正式和非正式分类法应用于综合数字化的生物聚会（IDIGBIO）中的数字化化石植物标本； （4）维护一个社区论坛，以供有关PBOT内容的专家评论。作为该项目的一部分，研究人员将使用PBOT来填充PBDB，并从白垩纪通过始新世从白垩纪进行古生物叶化石数据集填充PBDB，并在过去1亿年的最温暖的间隔内分析多样性和气候变化。总体而言，PBOT提供的数据将实现对古气候和植物宏观生态学和植物宏观生物学和进化的综合分析，这些分析迄今为止都无法使用。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并被认为是通过基金会的知识分子优点和更广泛的影响审查标准通过评估来获得的支持。