Neotoma Paleoecology Database

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The Neotoma Paleoecology Database (Neotoma) is an open international data resource that stores and shares multiple kinds of fossil, paleoecological, and paleoenvironmental data.^[1] Neotoma specializes in fossil data holdings at timescales covering the last several decades to the last several million years. Neotoma is organized and led by scientists and enhances data consistency through community curation by experts. Neotoma data are open to all and available to anyone with an internet connection.

Neotoma data are used by scientists and teachers (especially paleoecologists, biogeographers, and archaeologists) to study the responses of species and ecosystems to past environmental change and growing human activity. Paleoclimatologists use Neotoma data to help reconstruct past climates.^[2] Sample research questions addressed include: 1) How sensitive are ecosystems to past climate change.^[3] 2) Why were rates of tree range expansion so fast after the end of the last ice age, given that tree seed dispersal distances are usually so short (Reid's Paradox)? 3) Where and when did humans begin transforming ecosystems?^[4] 4) What were the causes and consequences of the widespread extinctions of large animals over the last 50,000 years?^[5][6]  5) Which ecosystems are characterized by abrupt change between alternate stable states and what triggers these abrupt changes?^[7] 6) How have freshwater resources and aquatic ecosystems been affected by human land use and activity over the last several decades?^[8][9]