Workshop Proposal for Deep Time Earth-Life Observatories (DETELOs)

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Workshop Proposal for Deep Time Earth-Life Observatories (DETELOs)David Bottjer and Douglas ErwinOver the past few decades it has become apparent that many very significant scientific problems are best addressed by teams of collaborating scientists representing a wide range of expertise. Indeed, progress in many issues can be achieved in no other way. Major advances in understanding critical transitions in the history of life require integration of paleontological, geochemical, biological, stratigraphic and other information into a temporal and spatial framework. Only within such a framework can the community understand the processes that have driven such transitions in the biosphere. In response to these changes in the nature of scientific inquiry, the Paleontological Society in conjunction with other paleontological groups, proposes to organize a workshop accompanied by a series of research forums to develop the concept of Deep Time Earth-Life Observatories (DETELOs), a new concept that emerged from a recent community workshop on Future Research Directions in Paleontology (FRDP). In the past, the development of integrated datasets and associated analyses has occurred in an uncoordinated and often haphazard fashion. As a result many critical questions remain unresolved, and we have little knowledge of the underlying process of biotic diversification or diversity loss, in part because of a lack of quantitative models with testable predictions. DETELOs are designed to address these problems in a coordinated fashion. This new workshop will include 22 participants, and is scheduled for 23-25 April, 2010 at the Department of Paleobiology of the National Museum of Natural History (Smithsonian Institution). The results of the workshop will be discussed with the broader paleontological community at Geological Society of America Annual Meetings in Denver (November, 2010) and Minneapolis (October, 2011). The final product of this effort will be a document of 10- 20 pages.