Reconstructing the ecology and extinction dynamics of Late Quaternary megafauna in China

重建中国晚第四纪巨型动物的生态和灭绝动态

• 批准号: 2390319
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University College London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2020 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2390319
• 关键词: Reconstructing; ecology; extinction; dynamics; Late

Understanding the species diversity and structure of past ecosystems and the extent to which they have been affected through time by human activities and climate change is essential to understand the magnitude and pattern of human impacts on biodiversity through time, in order to make predictive hypotheses for modern conservation science. Extensive research has been conducted on the past diversity of Quaternary megafauna, and the chronology and pattern of megafaunal turnover, for Europe, North America and Australia, with the aim of understanding if humans or climate (or another reason) was the principle cause for the mass extinctions that wiped out large, well known species such as Megaloceros giganteus (giant deer) or Mammuthus primigenius (woolly mammoth). China is currently a world hotspot for conservation across numerous biomes and is a country with many mammal species at risk due to habitat destruction and overexploitation. Despite this, there are limited region-wide studies aimed at developing a better understanding of what was happening to ecosystems during the Late Pleistocene. My research aims to gather together all existing data on the past spatiotemporal distributions of large mammal species in China across the Late Pleistocene, to reconstruct past distributions of living and extinct megafaunal species and document how these changed over time. From this baseline I will then compare these ranges with temporal correlates such as climate change events and timing of known human evolutionary and demographic changes and examine how these external drivers match changes in faunal composition. It will also be possible to compare and link faunal changes to other palaeoenvironmental indices, such as past vegetation changes mapped through pollen data and changes to local environments highlighted by assemblages of micromammals from archaeological sites.

了解过去生态系统的物种多样性和结构，以及它们在多大程度上受到人类活动和气候变化的影响，对于了解人类对生物多样性长期影响的程度和模式至关重要，以便为现代保护科学做出预测性假设。对欧洲、北美和澳大利亚第四纪巨型动物过去的多样性以及巨型动物更替的年代和模式进行了广泛的研究，目的是了解人类或气候（或其他原因）是否是导致大型知名物种（如巨鹿）或猛犸象（长毛猛犸）灭绝的主要原因。中国目前是世界上众多生物群落保护的热点，由于栖息地破坏和过度开发，许多哺乳动物物种处于危险之中。尽管如此，有有限的区域范围内的研究，旨在更好地了解发生了什么事，生态系统在晚更新世。我的研究旨在收集所有现有的数据，在过去的时空分布的大型哺乳动物物种在中国整个晚更新世，重建过去的分布生活和灭绝的巨型动物物种，并记录这些如何随着时间的推移而变化。从这个基线，我将比较这些范围与时间相关，如气候变化事件和已知的人类进化和人口变化的时间，并研究这些外部驱动因素如何匹配动物群组成的变化。还可以将动物群的变化与其他古环境指数进行比较和联系，例如通过花粉数据绘制的过去植被变化以及考古遗址微型哺乳动物群落强调的当地环境变化。