SLE395 - Palaeobiology
Unit details
Year | 2015 unit information |
---|---|
Offering information: | Not offered in 2015 (available from 2016 onwards) |
Enrolment modes: | Trimester 1: Burwood (Melbourne), Cloud (online)
|
Credit point(s): | 1 |
Previously coded as: | SBB395 |
EFTSL value: | 0.125 |
Unit chair: | Mark Warne |
Prerequisite: | One of SLE102, SLE136, SLE103 or plus two level 2 units |
Corequisite: | Nil |
Incompatible with: | Nil |
Contact hours: | Campus: 1 x 2 hour class per week, 6 x 3 hour practicals per trimester, 1 x half day field trip per trimester (weather dependant). Cloud (online): Learning experiences are via CloudDeakin. Students are also expected to attend 15 hours of intensive classes and practicals at the Burwood (Melbourne) campus. |
Content
This unit provides students with an opportunity to study deep-time aspects of the biological and environmental sciences. Class include:
- Fossils of the terrestrial realm and their environments of preservation;
- Fossils of the marine realm and their environments of preservation;
- relative and absolute dating of fossils;
- biological evolution and the fossil record, including discussions on radiation, convergence, rates of extinction and evolutionary trends;
- Precambrian, Palaeozoic, Mesozoic and Cenozoic life;
- Quaternary physical evolution of the earth and associated anthropological change;
- Microfossils as proxies of past oceanographic and climate change. Practical work will involve 2 projects. The first project will involve the description and biostratigraphical or palaeoecological evaluation of invertebrate fossils from a limestone, sandstone or mudstone exposure in SE Australia. The second project will involve the use of invertebrate microfossils or macrofossils as proxies of past environmental change within a human occupation historical timescale. This project will involve the examination of fossils from sediment cores gathered within a modern aquatic setting.
This unit will also include a half day field trip (or online virtual field tour), or tour of museum fossil preparatory laboratories.
Assessment
Practical report 1 40%, practical report 2 40%, class test 20%