Estimating the diversity of dinosaurs
Estimating the diversity of dinosaurs
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DOI：
10.1073/pnas.0606028103
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发表时间：
2006-09
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
Steve C. Wang;P. Dodson
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Steve C. Wang;P. Dodson
尽管目前人们对估计化石和现存群体的多样性感兴趣，但很少有人致力于估计恐龙的多样性。在这里，我们估计非鸟类恐龙的多样性约为 1,850 个属，包括那些尚待发现的恐龙。目前已描述的恐龙属有 527 个属，因此至少 71% 的恐龙属仍然未知。尽管已知的多样性在白垩纪最后阶段下降，但估计的多样性保持稳定，这表明恐龙作为一个整体在最终灭绝前的一千万年里并没有减少。我们还表明，已知的多样性会因化石岩石露头的可用性而产生偏差。最后，通过使用逻辑模型，我们预测 75% 的可发现属将在 60-100 年内为人所知，90% 将在 100-140 年内为人所知。由于影响化石发现过程的非随机因素（这排除了计算实际置信界限的可能性），我们对多样性的估计可能是一个下限。
Despite current interest in estimating the diversity of fossil and extant groups, little effort has been devoted to estimating the diversity of dinosaurs. Here we estimate the diversity of nonavian dinosaurs at ≈1,850 genera, including those that remain to be discovered. With 527 genera currently described, at least 71% of dinosaur genera thus remain unknown. Although known diversity declined in the last stage of the Cretaceous, estimated diversity was steady, suggesting that dinosaurs as a whole were not in decline in the 10 million years before their ultimate extinction. We also show that known diversity is biased by the availability of fossiliferous rock outcrop. Finally, by using a logistic model, we predict that 75% of discoverable genera will be known within 60–100 years and 90% within 100–140 years. Because of nonrandom factors affecting the process of fossil discovery (which preclude the possibility of computing realistic confidence bounds), our estimate of diversity is likely to be a lower bound.