Sumatra’s role in ancient human movements and evolution. This project aims to test whether humans moving through Southeast Asia used a savannah corridor, facilitating their migrations into Sumatra and Java, and examine the effect of rainforests on human movements and evolution. This will be accomplished by examining ecological proxies from vertebrate remains found in established and newly identified fossil sites in Sumatra. These results are expected to provide a new understanding of the environ ....Sumatra’s role in ancient human movements and evolution. This project aims to test whether humans moving through Southeast Asia used a savannah corridor, facilitating their migrations into Sumatra and Java, and examine the effect of rainforests on human movements and evolution. This will be accomplished by examining ecological proxies from vertebrate remains found in established and newly identified fossil sites in Sumatra. These results are expected to provide a new understanding of the environmental context of human evolution in Asia, and identify routes ancient people took as they moved south through Asia and into Australia.Read moreRead less
Maximising accuracy and reliability of carbonate climate proxy archives. This project brings together expertise and cutting-edge methodology from different disciplines to identify the controls on the compositions of the shells and skeletons of marine organisms. The compositions of these materials are essential tools to reconstruct environmental conditions before modern climate records began. However, recent insights into how they form profoundly complicate and affect their interpretations.
The r ....Maximising accuracy and reliability of carbonate climate proxy archives. This project brings together expertise and cutting-edge methodology from different disciplines to identify the controls on the compositions of the shells and skeletons of marine organisms. The compositions of these materials are essential tools to reconstruct environmental conditions before modern climate records began. However, recent insights into how they form profoundly complicate and affect their interpretations.
The results will enable us to develop new, realistic models for the behaviour of chemical elements in these materials. This will significantly improve paleoclimate interpretations and provide critical benefit for protecting Australia’s marine resources in the future. Read moreRead less
Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment And Facilities - Grant ID: LE170100177
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$290,000.00
Summary
A regional optical dating facility in Australia. This project aims to establish an open access, end-user friendly optical dating facility in Australia. This will address shortcomings in the capacity and geographical coverage of the existing national geochronology infrastructure and enable Australian researchers to reconstruct past records of climate change, human evolution, ecological vulnerabilities, natural and man-made hazards and environmental disturbance over historical to near-million-year ....A regional optical dating facility in Australia. This project aims to establish an open access, end-user friendly optical dating facility in Australia. This will address shortcomings in the capacity and geographical coverage of the existing national geochronology infrastructure and enable Australian researchers to reconstruct past records of climate change, human evolution, ecological vulnerabilities, natural and man-made hazards and environmental disturbance over historical to near-million-year timeframes. This project is expected to increase commercial demand for geoscience services and lead to better understanding of Australia’s natural heritage and its long-term vulnerabilities.Read moreRead less
The mighty ape’s last stand. This project aims to study the fate of primates in southern Asia, where evidence for megafaunal extinction is rare. Why Gigantopithecus blacki, the largest ever primate, disappeared is unknown, while humans in the region survived. This project will model dating techniques across sites to identify a precise extinction window and compare behaviour and past environmental conditions to determine why the ape failed and man persevered. Outcomes will generate a new understa ....The mighty ape’s last stand. This project aims to study the fate of primates in southern Asia, where evidence for megafaunal extinction is rare. Why Gigantopithecus blacki, the largest ever primate, disappeared is unknown, while humans in the region survived. This project will model dating techniques across sites to identify a precise extinction window and compare behaviour and past environmental conditions to determine why the ape failed and man persevered. Outcomes will generate a new understanding of past environmental change as a driver of megafaunal extinction in comparison with human adaption and survival.Read moreRead less
Building giants: the origins of extreme biology in baleen whales. Baleen whales are unlike any other animal. They have evolved unparalleled specialisations for feeding, hearing, smell, cognition and – above all – the largest ever body size. These extreme features underlie the unmatched dominance of baleen whales in today's oceans. The origins of these key adaptations required major changes in the anatomy and function of the skull and teeth. However, exactly how and when the extreme innovations o ....Building giants: the origins of extreme biology in baleen whales. Baleen whales are unlike any other animal. They have evolved unparalleled specialisations for feeding, hearing, smell, cognition and – above all – the largest ever body size. These extreme features underlie the unmatched dominance of baleen whales in today's oceans. The origins of these key adaptations required major changes in the anatomy and function of the skull and teeth. However, exactly how and when the extreme innovations of baleen whales began remains an outstanding question in animal biology. This proposal aims to combine exceptional Australian fossils with recent advances in 3D imaging, biomechanics, and evolutionary analysis to discover how the secrets to the success of baleen whales first evolved.Read moreRead less
Driving a palaeomagnetic revolution: geophysical and environmental signals from magnetic biominerals. Magnetotactic bacteria biomineralise magnetic nanoparticles. They are ubiquitous in aquatic environments, so their inorganic remains (magnetofossils) should give rise to sedimentary palaeomagnetic signals. Ancient magnetofossil identifications were sparse until new techniques recently demonstrated their extensive geological occurrence. This project proposes to determine: the mechanisms by which ....Driving a palaeomagnetic revolution: geophysical and environmental signals from magnetic biominerals. Magnetotactic bacteria biomineralise magnetic nanoparticles. They are ubiquitous in aquatic environments, so their inorganic remains (magnetofossils) should give rise to sedimentary palaeomagnetic signals. Ancient magnetofossil identifications were sparse until new techniques recently demonstrated their extensive geological occurrence. This project proposes to determine: the mechanisms by which magnetofossils contribute to sedimentary palaeomagnetic signals; if magnetofossil occurrences provide information about the marine carbon cycle; and, if magnetofossil chemistry can constrain the depth of sedimentary palaeomagnetic signal acquisition. These are major outstanding questions in sedimentary palaeomagnetism.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE130100467
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$374,823.00
Summary
Limbs and wings: reconstructing Australian environmental change through innovative analysis of ancient mammal skeletons. An animal's skeleton is the product of a complex relationship between its habits, habitat and evolutionary history. This project uses a vast resource of World Heritage fossil skeletons from Riversleigh to determine how behaviour and ecology of Australia's mammals have changed over the last 25 million years and will need to adapt in the future.
Utilizing the geological record to constrain the response of marine ecosystems and global carbon cycling to warming and de-oxygenation. Earth history is punctuated by a huge variety of transitions and perturbations in climate, biogeochemical cycling, and ecosystems, some of which may hold direct future-relevant information. In the oceans, these are closely linked in a complex web of feedbacks, as well as to the oxygenation of the ocean and the ultimate geological fate of excessive carbon release ....Utilizing the geological record to constrain the response of marine ecosystems and global carbon cycling to warming and de-oxygenation. Earth history is punctuated by a huge variety of transitions and perturbations in climate, biogeochemical cycling, and ecosystems, some of which may hold direct future-relevant information. In the oceans, these are closely linked in a complex web of feedbacks, as well as to the oxygenation of the ocean and the ultimate geological fate of excessive carbon released into the atmosphere – burial of carbon in sediments. This project will develop a computer model representation of this coupled carbon-climate-life system and test this against the geological record, explore the causes and consequences of carbon release events and extinctions as well as how the ocean floor delivery and preservation of organic carbon responds.Read moreRead less
Geomorphological development of coral reefs, southern Great Barrier Reef: an integrated record of Holocene palaeoecology and palaeoclimate from cores. Very little is known about how the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) has responded or may respond to predicted environmental change and/or degradation. The project will reconstruct the recent biological and physical history of reefs in the southern GBR in order to better understand how they may react to future environmental changes.
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE150100862
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$338,110.00
Summary
The evolution of mammalian developmental patterns in deep time. Why are some groups of marsupials more morphologically diverse than others? The patterns and processes occurring over development shape adult variability, and yet these remain poorly understood and unknown across marsupials. This significantly limits understanding of how marsupial diversity has evolved. This project aims to use novel analytical methods to provide the first empirical data on how marsupials grow, and how those pattern ....The evolution of mammalian developmental patterns in deep time. Why are some groups of marsupials more morphologically diverse than others? The patterns and processes occurring over development shape adult variability, and yet these remain poorly understood and unknown across marsupials. This significantly limits understanding of how marsupial diversity has evolved. This project aims to use novel analytical methods to provide the first empirical data on how marsupials grow, and how those patterns have evolved over time. In doing so it will yield fundamental insight into why Australia's marsupials are so diverse, and how morphological traits interact over development to shape this diversity; this knowledge is key to understanding how morphological diversity is generated and what determines how species evolve.Read moreRead less