This module focuses on the long-term patterns of speciation, diversity, morphology change and extinction that have shaped life on Earth. Students will examine how these patterns are influenced by environmental and climatic changes, as well as biotic controls such as competition, predation and co-evolution. Through critical analysis of large-scale palaeontological datasets, students will develop the skills to evaluate the drivers of large-scale patterns of evolution and appraise evolutionary responses to environmental challenges. The content will span both terrestrial and marine realms, and includes plant, invertebrate and microfossil groups to provide a broad perspective on evolutionary trends.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the module students should be able to:
Show a detailed understanding of key patterns in the long-term records of speciation, extinction and trends in morphological evolution and adaptation across multiple marine and terrestrial, invertebrate, and micro- fossil groups.
Be able to formulate the potential abiotic (climate, environment, palaeogeography) and biotic (competition, predation, co-evolution) drivers of large-scale patterns of evolution.
Be able to manage and examine palaeontological datasets in the context of macroevolutionary studies.
Be able to use palaeontological data and palaeobiological theory to question and debate issues of modern global change biology.
