Going Further
Variations
You may want to review another genus at the Lost Pond site. Not all species respond to climate changes in the same way since they have unique environmental tolerances. Interestingly, the angiosperm genus Fagus (beech) found at the site is a distant relative of the Nothofagidites we examined in the Antarctic.
Alternately, you can test a series of sites along a transect paralleling a latitude or longitude line. To do this you will want to build a spreadsheet that has latitude and longitude as you did before. This time however, each value will be unique based on the studies you access using the Pollen Database. For each study you can select the independent variable of time and use only one % abundance per site as your dependent variable. In this way, you will be able to create a "snapshot" of distribution over a large spatial range in the manner of Pollen Viewer.
Other Data
The Marine Geoscience Data System offers additional educational modules that use GeoMapApp. GeoMapApp is a predecessor to Virtual Ocean and it uses the same datasets. Visit educational modules for more ideas and information.
Related Case Studies
Other EET chapters that explore ocean coring and / or use GeoMapApp include:
Exploring Seafloor Topography—Explore a timeline about how we have learned about the oceans. Construct a profile across the Atlantic Ocean and create 3-D visualizations of the seafloor. Uses GeoMapApp.
Climate History from Deep Sea Sediments—Locate potential core, log, and seismic data to map the marine sediment biostratigraphy. Search for a specific planktonic foraminifera that prefers warmer ocean conditions. Uses GeoMapApp.
Life in Extreme Environments—Create topographic profiles of the ocean floor to explore the structure of a spreading center. Learn about the life forms found in these extreme environments and investigate the conditions affecting them. Uses GeoMapApp.
Cool Cores Capture Climate Change—Interpret indicators of climate change recorded in sediment cores, make predictions about core profiles based on known climate change processes, and analyze cores from the Southern Ocean floor near Antarctica.
Within the EET there are several related case studies that explore the the causes and / or impacts of climate change. These lessons could be used to develop a complete unit on the topic.
Is Greenland Melting?—Explore working conditions on the Greenland Ice Sheet, measure melt area extents and rate of glacial movement with My World GIS.
Understanding Carbon Storage in Forests—Compare field collected data with results produced by a forest biomass model to understand the process and challenges scientists face when doing terrestrial carbon cycle research.
Exploring Regional Differences in Climate Change—Produce and analyze graphs to compare climate predictions among U.S. states through the year 2100.
Whither Arctic Sea Ice?—Animate thirty years of sea ice images, measure the ice extent each year, and then graph and analyze the results.
Exploring NCAR Climate Change Data Using GIS—Use ArcGIS to visualize and analyze NCAR climate change scenario.
Using NASA NEO and ImageJ to Explore the Role of Snow Cover in Shaping Climate—Use ImageJ to explore and animate satellite images of reflected short wave radiation, snow cover, and land surface temperature downloaded from the NASA Earth Observation (NEO) website. Then use NEO's Image Composite Editor (ICE) to observe, graph, and analyze the relationship between these three variables.
Envisioning Climate Change Using a Global Climate Model—Run climate modeling software to visualize how temperature and snow coverage might change over the next 100 years.
