Reconstructing Rivers: Interpreting the Cretaceous Paleo-environment of the Cedar Mountain Formation, Utah - REU Site

这个为期八周的项目将由Gustavus Adolphus学院主办，将为参与者提供一个为及时进行沉积地质学研究做出贡献的难得机会。八名本科生、两名学生助教和PI将通过实地研究调查犹他州东北部和中东部雪松山组(CMF)含化石的下白垩统地层的沉积史。为了更好地了解CMF的分布和沉积过程，参与者将在明尼苏达大学圣安东尼瀑布实验室设计和开发河流沉积学实验。最近在CMF恐龙化石地点的发现使古生物学家认识到大型蜥脚类动物仍然存在，此前人们认为大型蜥脚类动物在白垩纪中期在北美灭绝。目前，五个学术和政府研究小组正在进行化石发掘和年代学研究。然而，沉积学分析，特别是用来描述恐龙栖息地和河流过程的相解释，在CMF相对不发达。拟议的项目将建立在PI以学生为中心在恐龙国家纪念碑及其周围进行研究的四年历史的基础上，其中包括2002年夏天的一个REU项目。在2003年夏季，该项目将在地理上扩大，包括犹他州中东部和拱门国家纪念碑的CMF露头。这项研究项目将逐步发展学生的研究技能，以了解和环境解释CMF。该项目的结果将对北美古生物学家具有非常重要的意义，因此将为学生参与者提供他们研究的相关性的直接感觉。在整个项目中，PI和来访的科学家将培养学生对观察、解释和实验的思考。与过去一样，国际和平协会将以实现参与者性别、地理分布和少数群体地位多样化为明确目标进行招募。

This eight-week project, to be hosted by Gustavus Adolphus College, will provide participants with an exceptional opportunity to contribute to timely research in Sedimentary Geology. Eight undergraduate students, two student Teaching Assistants, and the PI will investigate, through field research, the sedimentary history of fossil-bearing Lower Cretaceous strata of the Cedar Mountain Formation (CMF) in northeast and east central Utah. In order to gain a better understanding of the processes of distribution and deposition of the CMF, participants will design and develop experiments in fluvial sedimentology at the University of Minnesota's Saint Anthony Falls Laboratory.Recent discoveries of dinosaur fossil localities in the CMF have led paleontologists to recognize that large sauropods, previously thought to be extinct in North America in mid-Cretaceious time, were still extant. Currently, five academic and governmental research groups have fossil excavations and geochronologic study underway. Yet sedimentologic analysis, especially facies interpretation to characterize dinosaur habitats and fluvial processes, is relatively undeveloped in the CMF. The proposed project will build on the PI's four-year history of student-centered research in and around Dinosaur Naitonal Monument, which has included an REU project during summer 2002. During summer 2003, the project will be geographically expanded to include CMF outcrops in east central Utah and in Arches National Monument.This research project will progressively develop students' research skills toward an understanding and environmental interpretation of the CMF. The results of this project will be highly significant to North American paleontologists, and will thus provide student participants with an immediate sense of the relevance of their research. Throughout the program, the PI and visiting scientists will develop students' thinking about observation, interpretation, and experimentation. As in the past, the PI will recruit with the explicit goal of achieving diversity in gender, geographic distribution, and minority status of participants.