The University of California Museum of Paleontology and the National Center for Science Education are undertaking a new project that ultimately will enhance 21st Century science literacy in the context of the causes and consequences of global change.

The need:

Although scientists are in agreement that significant changes (including climate change) are occurring on a global level, the public remains confused and often views statements of change with ill-founded skepticism and in some instances denial about the causes and implications of these changes.  K-16 teachers and the general public need a source of information that is accessible and scientifically valid, that describes and explains the nature and impact of global change, and that describes the processes by which scientists arrive at their consensus opinions.  Teachers need a “one-stop shop” for global change resources, much as they have a site for evolution education resources in Understanding Evolution, and for resources for the teaching of the nature of science in Understanding Science.  The web resource that we propose, Understanding Global Change, will meet these needs.

The impact:

We have chosen to focus on a resource for K-16 educators given that an individual’s basic science literacy and critical thinking begin to grow during formal and informal K-12 education and mature in higher education.  To this end, the immediate goals of the project are to develop a freely accessible and engaging web-based resource that (1) provides K-16 science educators with an improved understanding of the processes, causes and rates of global change through time and their resulting biotic impacts, (2) provides clarity on the strengths and limitations of scientific arguments about global change, i.e., how we know what we know and what we currently do not know, and (3) provides resources and strategies that encourage and enable K-16 teachers to incorporate the impact of global change into their teaching.  In turn, this will afford the opportunity for their students, and ultimately the general public, to better understand the science behind global change impacts, its relevance to society, the role of human agency in both cause and solution, and how science arrives at its current thinking.

We look forward to working with NCSE and an energetic Advisory Board to develop this much-needed resource and are grateful to the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation for providing funding for the endeavor.

UCMP,  in partnership with the Museum of the Earth, the University of Kansas Natural History Museum, and the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, has received a National Leadership Grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences: The Tree Room: Teaching and learning about evolutionary relationships

This three-year project will result in a freely accessible online resource for science educators and ISI professionals – The Tree Room. Building on scientific expertise, the learning research, and current project partner efforts, this resource will clarify what evolutionary trees are, how to read and interpret them, how they are built, how they inform research, and their applications relevant to society.  The project will clarify common misconceptions about trees, identify best practices for using trees in exhibits, and provide lessons and tools for teaching about trees.

The Tree Room will become part of the already highly successful Understanding Evolution website and will target K-16 teachers and ISI professionals but will ultimately serve students and the broader public by helping members of the target audience communicate more effectively about evolutionary trees as important scientific tools.

This project will have national impact on three levels by:

• Increasing the number of K-16 teachers and informal science educators who are prepared to teach about trees and able to clarify student and visitor misconceptions.
• Increasing the capacity of museums to develop effective exhibit and program components that integrate evolutionary trees by providing access to learning research and best practices gained through case study analysis.
• Increasing public understanding of evolutionary trees.

Measurable outcomes of the project will include:

• Improvements in teachers’ understanding of evolutionary trees.
• Increases in teachers’ confidence in working with trees and associated scientific data, and improved skills in synthesizing and transforming that knowledge for the classroom.
• Improvements in teachers’ skill and capacity for communicating concepts associated with biological trees in the framework of local, state and national science education standards.
• Increases in teachers’ ability to explain tree depictions in the popular press or in textbooks that may otherwise result in student misconceptions.
• Increases in ISI professionals’ use of trees in new exhibit designs.
• Improved use of trees in ISI exhibits in ways that better reflect the results of the learning research and best practices as established through case studies of tree visualizations in other institutions.
• Increases in ISI professionals’ confidence in using tree visualizations in museum interpretive activities and in discussing existing tree diagrams with visitors.

Teachers better prepared to incorporate trees into instruction and ISI professionals with a deeper understanding of the role of trees in exhibits will lead to a more scientifically literate public—one that appreciates the central role that evolutionary relationships play in a modern understanding of biology.

About once a month, I drive from Berkeley to Walnut Creek to pick up specimens for my thesis (dead birds for a study of the evolution of development in Aves), which necessitates a pass through the Caldecott Tunnel. Each time, I heave a sigh and try to shore up my patience as traffic before the tunnels slows to a stop. However, this bane has recently metamorphosed into an object of great interest, for it has come to my attention that the construction here is also uncovering of one of Earth’s most alluring treasures: fossils!

The construction workers are burrowing through rocks that are 9 to 16 million years old. Here, the hills have yielded thousands of fossils of all types of organisms, from plants, to vertebrates and invertebrates, to microfossils (very tiny plants and animals). They, in turn, provide clues to the past flora, fauna, and paleoenvironment of the Bay Area. Who knew that such a wealth of fossils could be found so nearby?

This semester, I am fortunate enough to be a Graduate Student Researcher (GSR) in the UC Museum of Paleontology (UCMP), a position funded by the California State Department of Transportation (known locally as Caltrans) as a component of a new partnership with the UCMP. The plan, in short, is for Caltrans to deposit the fossils recovered from the 4th bore Caldecott Tunnel construction project in UCMP, and for UCMP to clean, catalogue, and curate them. For further details on the UCMP/Caltrans project, please see Mark Goodwin’s article. As the GSR for this project, it will be my job to prepare the fossils by cleaning the dirt off, gluing together what is broken, and properly curating them in the museum.

Scanning the Prep Lab from left to right. Click on the image to see an enlargement.

When I was a little girl with aspirations to become a scientist and study fossils, I was a volunteer paleontologist at Anza-Borrego Desert State Park in southeastern California. It was here that I first discovered the appeal of fossil preparation, and the wonderful feeling of reward that comes after many hours of meticulous work. Thus, I am quite excited about the work that I will do over the next few months!

I’ve just completed a scrub-down and organization of the UCMP fossil preparation lab in anticipation of this work, and the boxes of fossils will be arriving soon! As I proceed, I will report on the exciting finds that come to light as each box is opened, and the tale these fossils recount about the paleontology and geology of the East Bay hills.

Jeff Benca is a welcome addition to the Department of Integrative Biology and UCMP’s highly active paleobotany group as a member of Cindy Looy’s lab.  However, Jeff also spends a lot of his time “up the hill” at the UC Botanical Garden, where he has been given space for his astonishing collection of lycopods that he brought with him from his days at the University of Washington. This ancient vascular plant group (along with rare carnivorous plants and orchids) actually caught his interest while he was still a high school student in Seattle, but since those days, he has not only found ways to cultivate the plants, but is conducting research on both modern and extinct members of the lineage. Jeff hopes to discover how members of the lycopod group survived and thrived through the End-Permian extinction, 252 million years ago.

Both his research focus and unabashed enthusiasm caught the attention of National Geographic’s Explorers Journal and UC Berkeley’s News Center.

Twenty-two scientists including lead author Tony Barnosky urge us to understand the danger of global environmental tipping points in their review paper in the June 7 issue of Nature. They examine data from past global environmental changes, compare it to how humans are changing the planet today, and discuss what that could mean for our future. They conclude that if we continue at our current rates of environmental destruction and resource use there will be dramatic impacts on the quality of life for coming generations.

For more information on the paper, including a video interview with Barnosky and a summary of how this research ties to The Berkeley Initiative in Global Change Biology, read the full press release at the UC Berkeley News Center.

The UCMP websites continue to rack up recognition and serve users around the world. Here's a taste of the latest website news:

• Understanding Evolution has been recognized as a key teaching resource in a recent NAS publication, Thinking Evolutionarily: Evolution Education Across the Life Sciences: Summary of a Convocation that was organized by a committee under the aegis of the Board on Life Sciences of the National Research Council (NRC) and the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and held on October 25-26, 2011.
• Understanding Evolution also received recognition as “Best of the Web” by the Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News!  Read more here.
• Understanding Science continues to gain popularity and now has international recognition with translations underway in Polish by the Center for Citizenship Education in Warsaw and in Swedish by the Center for Biosciences and Nutrition in Stockholm.
• Of particular interest is the Arusha project spearheaded by UCMP Faculty Curator, Leslea Hlusko, in which 37 teachers in 18 schools participated in workshops  to talk through the scientific process, how they teach it in their classrooms, and also to translate the Understanding Science flowchart into Kiswahili.  Their goal is to make this Kiswahili version of the Understanding Science flowchart available to all schools in East Africa that may be interested in it.

The Arusha Project

The Understanding Science flowchart in Kiswahili

Cal Day is the one day of the year when lucky members of the public can tour UCMP's collection. But this year, on the night before Cal Day, UCMP hosted a special event to take some of our closest friends behind the scenes.

Excitement is in the air. Also, a T. rex tail!

This invitation-only event included sneak previews of Cal Day exhibits, tours of the collection, the paleo art of William Gordan Huff, and fossils recovered during the construction of the Caldecott Tunnel's fourth bore.

UCMP-affiliated faculty curators, scientists, students, and educators were on hand to present a night that our guests won't soon forget. After some mingling and introductory remarks from Director Charles Marshall our visitors were whisked into the collection to enjoy a glimpse of the exciting work happening at UCMP.

Charles in action.

Ken Finger serves up some local fossils, fresh from the Caldecott Tunnel site.

Renske Kirchholtes and Robert Stevenson explain the story of Metasequioa to our guests.

Theresa Grieco showed off monkey fossils and talked about her upcoming trip to Olduvai Gorge (photo by Silvia Spiva).

Pat Holroyd revealed some of the hidden treasures of UCMP being uncovered thanks to our latest archiving grant.

Dave Lindberg neatly demonstrated how our vast collection provides an essential historic baseline for the natural history of California.

Anna Thanukos took visitors beyond the collection through the museum's many education and outreach projects.

Ash Poust dazzled onlookers with phytosaurs, pareiasaurs, and other impressive fossils from our broad collection.

Brian Swartz led the group from the sea to dry land with close-up looks at some of our fishy ancestors.

Diane Erwin pieced together a climate change puzzle using UCMP's California plant fossils.

This exciting, unique UCMP experience produced many smiles and set the tone for the Cal Day to come.

For more photos from the evening see this album on Facebook.

Find out how to become a Friend of UCMP.

We are pleased to announce the receipt of a grant of ~ $470,000 from the National Science Foundation – a two-year collections improvement grant to "Complete the rehabilitation of the orphaned USGS fossil invertebrate collection at UCMP."

In 1997 the University of California Museum of Paleontology (UCMP) accepted responsibility for an extensive invertebrate collection (170,000 fossils from 12,100 localities) the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Menlo Park. Unfortunately, the comprehensive documentation stored with the fossils was not preserved as archival material and was deteriorating.  Moreover, during the move the collection was scrambled, many of the wooden cases damaged, and the doors lost.  In 1998, one third of the collection was integrated into UCMP’s main collection.  This project will (1) re-house the remaining two thirds of the collection in museum-grade cabinets, (2) reorganize, re-label, and digitally capture the contents of the drawers, and (3) digitally capture and store the documentation in archival media.

This collection, largely from the West coast of North America from the last 25 million years, is unique and irreplaceable. It has generated over 1,000 publications, including systematic and biostratigraphic studies, paleoecological and paleoclimatic research, resource assessments, and geologic surveys.  Funds from this grant will provide important curatorial experiences for graduate students, engage undergraduate students in authentic research activities, and allow us to hire a Museum Scientist (invertebrate speciality) for the length of the project to direct the work.

Lucy Chang, who is advised by Charles Marshall, has been awarded a three-year National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. Lucy started as a Ph.D. student at Berkeley in 2010 with a general interest in paleoecology.  Upon notification of this award, Lucy initially expressed both gratefulness and shock, but is now settling in to the wonderful realization that this will give her just the time and resources needed to move forward on a dissertation topic with an interdisciplinary approach, integrating aspects of ecology, biogeography, and paleobiology  probably focused on marine systems.

Congratulations to Lucy!

Two graduate students in Tony Barnosky's lab, Emily Lindsey and Kaitlin Maguire, recently received the good news that they were the recipients of prestigious awards.

Emily Lindsey (second from left) with part of her field team in Ecuador. Photo by Tony Barnosky.

Emily had this to say about her Fulbright grant:

Kaitlin Maguire takes a break during field work in Oregon. Photo courtesy of Kaitlin Maguire.

"I received a Fulbright award to travel to Uruguay from March to December, 2013 (the academic year for the Southern Hemisphere). I will be working with colleagues at the National Museum of Natural History in Montevideo, where we will be putting together a database of Pleistocene fossil mammals for the South American continent — where the localities are, what taxa are found there, etc. This dovetails nicely with an NSF grant that Tony Barnosky (and I and several South and North American colleagues) received in December to radiocarbon-date several hundred bones of South American Pleistocene mammals to incorporate into such a database."

Kaitlin on receiving a Louderback Fund award:

"I am surprised and honored to receive the Louderback Fellowship. I plan to use the award to study diet change in Miocene horses of Oregon using stable isotope analyses. This award recognizes graduate students for their research and service to the UCMP. George D. Louderback was a geology professor and Dean of the College of Letters and Science at UC Berkeley in the early 1900s and I am happy to join the long list of esteemed UCMP graduate students and alumni who have previously received the fellowship."

Our congratulations to both!