Hostname: page-component-f554764f5-nt87m Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-04-21T06:11:03.822Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

On fossil preservation and the stratigraphic ranges of taxa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 February 2016

Andrew R. Solow  and
Woollcott Smith
Andrew R. Solow
Affiliation:
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543
Woollcott Smith
Affiliation:
Department of Statistics, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19081
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The fossil record is incomplete in the sense that taxa for which there are no preserved finds are unrepresented. Because the probability that there is at least one preserved find is greater for long-lived taxa, failure to account for this effect will bias estimation of mean taxonomic duration. This paper describes maximum likelihood estimation of mean taxonomic duration, fossil preservation rate, and completeness of the local fossil record under a model in which duration has an exponential distribution and the locations of preserved finds follow a Poisson process. The estimates under this model have simple closed forms. It is also straightforward to construct confidence regions for the model parameters. The method is applied to data on 110 trilobite species from the Upper Cambrian—Lower Ordovician in Oklahoma.

Type
Articles
Information
Paleobiology , Volume 23 , Issue 3 , Summer 1997 , pp. 271 - 277
Copyright
Copyright © The Paleontological Society 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Literature Cited

Cox, D. R., and Lewis, P. A. W. 1978. The statistical analysis of series of events. Chapman and Hall, London.Google Scholar
Foote, M., and Raup, D. M. 1996. Fossil preservation and the stratigraphic ranges of taxa. Paleobiology 22:121–140.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Foote, M. 1997. Estimating taxonomic durations and preservation probability. Paleobiology (in press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marshall, C. R. 1991. Estimation of taxonomic ranges from the fossil record. In Gilinsky, N. and Signor, P. W., eds. Analytical paleontology. Paleontological Society Short Courses in Paleontology 4:19–38. University of Tennessee, Knoxville.Google Scholar
Silvey, S. D. 1975. Statistical inference. Chapman and Hall, London.Google Scholar
Smith, A. B. 1994. Systematics and the fossil record. Blackwell Scientific, Oxford.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stitt, J.H. 1977. Late Cambrian and earliest Ordovician trilobites, Wichita Mountains Area, Oklahoma. Oklahoma Geological Survey Bulletin 124:1–179.Google Scholar
Taylor, H. M., and Karlin, S. 1984. An introduction to stochastic modelling. Academic Press, Orlando.Google Scholar