Quantitative Methods in Paleontology

The students will obtain theoretical knowledge and practical training in key approaches to analysis of paleontological data, including univariate and multivariate analysis of population structure, morphometry and image analysis, analysis of spatial and oriented data, quantitative biostratigraphy and phylogenetic analysis.

1) Ability to apply quantitative approaches to paleontological research and identify methods appropriate to different types of data
2) Practical knowledge of independently acquiring and analysing paleontological data and ability to critically evaluate the results of such analyses

basics in programming language R

The grade counts 50 % to the module grade, grading is based on a series of tasks that the students work on at home, individually or in small groups, and document their results in a written report.

Hausarbeit

See module description.

1st SWS: Introduction to the concept of data in paleontology
2nd SWS: Population structure - univarite methods
3rd SWS: Population structure - multivariate methods
4th SWS: Practical introduction to data handling with PAST
5th SWS: Practical to multivariate data analysis
6th SWS: Morphometry
7th SWS: Practical introduction to image analysis with ImageJ
8th SWS: Practical to morphometry with MorphoJ
9th SWS: Practical to extraction of morphometric data
10th SWS: Directional data and spatial data analysis
11th SWS: Practical to spatial and directional data
12th SWS: Biostratigraphy data analysis
13th SWS: Phylogenetic data analysis
14th SWS: Practical to phylogenetic data analysis

Notebook-Pool