Search fields for occurrence search
| Fossil group | Can be any of the fossil groups present in the database: currently, Diatoms (D), Foraminifera (F), Calcareous nannofossils (N), Radiolarians (R) and Dinoflagellates (DN). This search field is compulsory. |
| Genus & Species | To search for a specific genus or species, fill in this field (with one single taxon at a time). |
| Time span | Limit the output to a range of Ages (in Ma). Use '.' as decimal separator. E. g., 6 to 8.5 Ma. |
| Longitude & Latitude | Limit the output to a range of longitude/latitude (which has to be provided in decimal degrees, e. g. 30° 25' S should be inputted as -30.41667). |
| Ocean | Limit the output to a specific ocean basin. |
| Leg, Site & Hole | Limit the output to all sites from a specific DSDP/ODP leg or one or all holes from a specific DSDP/ODP Site. |
| Ecological province | Refers to Longhurst (1998) ecological province classification for the planktonic ecosystem. Beware that the province given for each site is the one to which the site currently belongs to. |
Search options
| Resolve taxonomy using TNL | Change taxa flagged as synonyms in the database into their corresponding synonyms. |
| Filter out questionable identifications and taxa invalidly included in the fossil group. | Get rid of taxa with status Q, I or U. |
| Filter out open-nomenclature taxa. | Get rid of taxa with status G. |
| Filter out problematic samples/occurrences (reworking, ...). | Get rid of occurrences and samples that have been flagged as possibly reworked or problematic. |
| Choose age scale | The ages in NSB are given on the Gradstein et al. 2012 timescale as of June 2015 (they were formerly given on the Berggren et al. 1995 timescale). Choosing another scale will output the ages transformed following a linear interpolation between the 2012 timescale and the chosen one. So far, choices include the main modern GPTS covering the C-sequence: Berggren et al. 1985, Cande & Kent 1995 (=Berggren et al. 1995), Gradstein et al. 2004 and 2012. |
| Filter out sites with age quality less than X | Get rid of occurrences and samples from sites for which the quality of the age model have been estimated to be less than X (age model quality ranges from Very Poor to Excellent). |
| Perform pacman trimming | Trim a certain percentage of the top and bottom of each species range. See Lazarus et al. (2012). |
Output fields
| Taxon ID, Genus, Species & Subspecies | Taxonomical information for the given taxa, as published in the original dataset. |
| Resolved Taxon, Resolved Genus, Resolved Species & Resolved Subspecies | Taxonomical information, with synonymies resolved according to an expert consensus. |
| SQ and GQ | Stands for 'Species Qualifier' and 'Genus Qualifier'. For open-nomenclature species, uncertain classifications or even morphogroups. |
| Taxon Status | V stands for Valid, S for Synonym, G for Genus-level taxon (i. e. open-nomenclature taxon), Q for Questionable determination, U for Unknown (status not determined), I (=O) for Invalid (mistakenly attributed to the group), H for higher-level taxon (e.g. families) and B for subspecific taxa. NB: for the time being, silicoflagellates and ebridians present in the database are entered as "Radiolarians" with a taxon_status of "I". |
| Fossil Group | Foraminifera (F), Radiolaria (R), Diatoms (D), Nannofossils (N) or Dinoflagellates (DN). |
| Sample ID | Unique identifier for the sample. |
| Leg, Site, Hole, Core, Section & Interval top | Information on the sample, as per DSDP/ODP/IODP classic nomenclature. |
| Depth (mbsf) | Depth of the sample, in meters below sea-floor. |
| Latitude & Longitude | Geographical information on the sample. |
| Estimated Paleo Latitude & Paleo Longitude | Reconstructed using GPlates based on NSB age model and on Seton et al. 2012 plate motion model. |
| Age (Ma) | Age (as entered in the Neptune database) in Ma, on the Gradstein et al. 2012 time-scale. |
| Age (Ma) followed by the name of the chosen timescale | Interpolation of the age of the sample on the time-scale chosen by the user. |
| Sample Group Abundance | Abundance of the fossil group, to which the species belongs to, in the given sample. |
| Sample Preservation & Taxon Abundance | Taxon abundance, when documented, is most frequently semi-quantitative (Trace, Rare, Few, ...). |
| Taxon Comment | Qualitative comment on the taxon. |
| Source | Publication from which the dataset containing the given occurrence originates. Note that the sources for the datasets entered prior to 2014 were not named and although we managed to track most of them back, some are still missing in the database and therefore this field could be empty in that case. |
| Longhurst code and province | Refers to Longhurst (1998) ecological province classification for the planktonic ecosystem. The province given for each site is the one to which the site currently belongs to. |
Stratigraphic Events
| Event Group | Field similar to fossil group (i. e. F, N, D, R, DN) with the addition of M for magnetostratigraphic reversals, I for isotopes and BL for Bolboforma zonations. |
| Event Type | Event types can be one of : TOP (i. e. last occurrence of a species, or top of a magnetochron), BOT (the opposite), FCO (for a first common occurrence), LCO (last common occurrence), ACME (for an occurrence peak), EVOL (for an evolutionary or a morphological transition), DISP (for a temporary regional disappearence), REAP (for a reapparence) or ZONE (for a stratigraphic zone). |
| Calibration Type | How was the event calibrated. Field similar to Event Group but can also be O (for orbital tuning). Other types of calibrations are spelled out (i. e. "Ammonites", etc.). |
| Original Scale | Original GPTS on which the event was calibrated (given here in short form: Berg85, CK95, Pal06 for Pälike et al. 2006, Grad04, Grad12). |
| Source Event | Publication in which the event was found on the given site. A certain amount of stratigraphic data that have been used to build the first age models of the database prior to 2014 have been added to the database without the original source. It will be corrected in time but until then the field contains only the name of the file that contained the data. |
| Source Calibration | Publication in which the event age was calibrated. |