Quantifying the dark data in museum fossil collections as palaeontology undergoes a second digital revolution

Abstract

Large-scale analysis of the fossil record requires aggregation of palaeontological data from individual fossil localities. Prior to computers, these synoptic datasets were compiled by hand, a laborious undertaking that took years of effort and forced palaeontologists to make difficult choices about what types of data to tabulate. The advent of desktop computers ushered in palaeontology's first digital revolution-online literature-based databases, such as the Paleobiology Database (PBDB). However, the published literature represents only a small proportion of the palaeontological data housed in museum collections. Although this issue has long been appreciated, the magnitude, and thus potential significance, of these so-called 'dark data' has been difficult to determine. Here, in the early phases of a second digital revolution in palaeontology--the digitization of museum collections-we provide an estimate of the magnitude of palaeontology's dark data. Digitization of our nine institutions' holdings of Cenozoic marine invertebrate collections from California, Oregon and Washington in the USA reveals that they represent 23 times the number of unique localities than are currently available in the PBDB. These data, and the vast quantity of similarly untapped dark data in other museum collections, will, when digitally mobilized, enhance palaeontologists' ability to make inferences about the patterns and processes of past evolutionary and ecological changes.

Using GIS to examine biogeographic and macroevolutionary patterns in some late Paleozoic cephalopods from the North American Midcontinent Sea

“…Given that species represent key macroevolutionary units in nature (Eldredge, 1989; Wiley & Lieberman, 2011; Hendricks et al, 2014), correctly characterizing them taxonomically, and thus validating the scope of their geographic distributions, is critical. Moreover, it has recently been shown by Marshall et al (2018) that incorporating museum specimen data in the manner that our study has can greatly expand, enhance, and improve knowledge of geographic distributions of fossil species, relative to studies that only utilize data from the PBDB. In the case of some species, ∼30% of the total considered, our analyses indicated moderate changes in stratigraphic range (addition of a stage, etc.)…”

Ten more years of discovery: revisiting the quality of the sauropodomorph dinosaur fossil record

“…Marshall et al . 2018). The assembly of this ‘dark’ data, and an informed understanding of sauropodomorph fossil collection practices, is beyond the scope of this study, but may provide a useful avenue for future research.…”

Novel analysis of locality data can inform better inventory and monitoring practices for paleontological resources at John Day Fossil Beds National Monument, Oregon, USA

“…Although some of these suggestions are specific to JODA, the principles of a flexible inventory and monitoring system could effectively be applied to other field programs run by public land managers, universities, or museums. Digitally mobilizing "dark" fossil locality information allows researchers to easily visualize large amounts of field collection data (Marshall et al, 2018). These data can be used to relocate old sites, identify underworked areas, or analyze fossil yield (Haug, 2016).…”

“…The park is now implementing a decoupled GPS system with Trimble R1 units connected to tablets via Bluetooth that allows direct transfer of coordinates from tablet to cloud service. Because both the aerial photograph coordinates and a majority of the GPS data associated with uncatalogued specimens required digitization of so-called "dark data" (Marshall et al, 2018), we chose to focus on a single area from the original five outlined by the cyclic prospecting schedule. First, we pulled previously digitized GPS data for cataloged museum specimens from the Interior Collections Management System (ICMS) database for JODA to visualize broad patterns in field collection since the establishment of the monument.…”