Collaborative research: Integrating tectonics, surface processes and paleobiodiversity using numerical and observational approaches

世界各地的山脉是许多不同种类动植物的生物多样性热点；然而，造山和生物多样性之间的深层时间关系仍然难以捉摸，需要生物学家、古生物学家和地球科学家之间的合作。该项目将重点研究将山地生长和侵蚀过程与物种运动和进化相结合的数值模型。该项目将预测山区生物多样性是如何在长时间尺度上产生、维持和保存的，然后利用化石记录来检验和改进这些预测。为了实现多学科合作，项目活动将包括在线教程和主要科学会议的研讨会，向生态学家、地质学家和生物地理学家的广大受众展示数值建模工具包。该工具包非常灵活，使广泛的研究人员能够解决跨越地球科学和进化生物学的复杂问题。该项目将支持三名处于教师、博士后和博士阶段的女性早期职业科学家的研究。该项目将最新的数值模型与观测数据联系起来，以弥合我们对地质时期地形-生物多样性关系的理解。通过同时模拟山地隆起、气候梯度的形成、陆地表面侵蚀、生物进化和扩散以及保存，该模型将模拟动态景观如何影响生物多样性以及化石记录中这种多样性的长期保存。模型预测将用现代和化石数据反复检验，重点放在北美西部著名的哺乳动物记录上。来自区域沉积、构造和古气候记录的地质信息将进一步为模型结果提供信息和检验。该项目将建立不同学科之间的合作，并利用这些联系来回答进化生物学中长期存在的问题，并通过互动编码研讨会向多学科受众传播知识。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Mountains across the globe are biodiversity hotspots for many different groups of plants and animals; however, the deep-time relationship between mountain building and biodiversity remains elusive and requires collaboration between biologists, paleontologists, and earth scientists. This project will focus on numerical models that couple processes of mountain growth and erosion with species movement and evolution. The project will make predictions about how mountain biodiversity is generated, maintained, and preserved over long timescales, and then use the fossil record to test and improve those predictions. To achieve multidisciplinary collaboration, project activities will include online tutorials and workshops at major scientific meetings that present the numerical modeling toolkit to a broad audience of ecologists, geologists, and biogeographers. The toolkit is highly flexible, enabling a wide range of researchers to address complex questions spanning earth sciences and evolutionary biology. This project will support the research of three female early-career scientists at the faculty, postdoctoral, and PhD stages.This project links a novel state-of-the-art numerical model with observational data to bridge our understanding of topography-biodiversity relationships over geologic time. By simultaneously modeling mountain uplift, the formation of climate gradients, land-surface erosion, biotic evolution and dispersal, and preservation, the model will simulate how dynamic landscapes influence biodiversity and the long-term preservation of that diversity in the fossil record. Model predictions will be iteratively tested with modern and fossil data, focusing on the well-known record of mammals in western North America. Geological information from regional sedimentary, tectonic, and paleoclimate records will further inform and test model results. The project will establish collaborations across different disciplines and use these connections to answer long-standing questions in evolutionary biology and disseminate knowledge to a multidisciplinary audience through interactive coding workshops.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.