ABSTRACT Foraminifera are single-celled organisms with and without shells (tests). They have an abundant fossil record over the past 545 million years and presence in modern oceans. The art of forams is dominated by hand-drawn scientific illustrations to scanning electron microscopic images done over the past 455 years, providing vital knowledge about shelled forams. From 1665 to 1835, forams were assigned to micro-invertebrates rather than single-celled forms. With more than 75,000 publications and nearly 50,000 described species of forams, illustrations must number more than 200,000. The illustrations include a range from simple line drawings through shaded ink and pencil renderings, sometimes even colored, to photographs and scanning electron micrographs. Forams also appear in other art forms: The Pyramids at Giza in Egypt, hand-sized models, jewelry, flooring, stamps, coins, sculptures, and a Chinese Foraminiferal Sculpture Park. Foraminiferal art, although very abundant in many forms, has not caught the attention of many people outside of foraminiferology.

ABSTRACT Postage stamps are small works of art seen by people worldwide that can be used effectively in education. The first paleontological stamp was released by India in 1951. Since then, over 4000 stamps with fossils, paleontologists, museums, and collecting sites have been issued by almost 200 countries. Stamps that illustrate fossils or reconstructions are intrinsically interesting and popular with many of the millions of stamp collectors. All disciplines of paleontology are represented, but dinosaurs are by far the most common subject, although even bacteria appear on a few stamps. Most of the stamps were scientifically accurate at the time they were issued though some artists took artistic liberties to fashion unique stamps. Overall, the stamps are artistic and educational because their small sizes and low cost make them easily accessible for classroom activities, exhibits, and presentations. They cover topics such as biodiversity, geology, ecology, oceanography, and evolution, among others. Paleophilately has provided art, education, joy, and happiness to people worldwide.

Abstract This paper describes and illustrates the foraminifera from Moorea, French Polynesia. Moorea, a high volcanic island in the south-central Pacific Ocean, is situated east of the tropical marine diversity hotspot in the Coral Triangle. It is significant as a recipient and redistributor of biotas by equatorial currents. The region thus represents a key area and stepping stone for transpacific faunal exchange, yet the foraminiferal fauna of Moorea has not been documented completely. We have conducted a comprehensive island-wide survey on modern, shallow-water benthic foraminifera to document the diversity, structure and composition of faunal assemblages from barrier reef, fringing reef, lagoon and bay inlet, and marsh and mangrove habitats. Here we present a fully illustrated atlas of benthic foraminifera from these shallow water habitats on Moorea and document patterns of species richness and spatial distribution. A total of 515 taxa were recorded, a number that almost triples previous species counts. The foraminiferal species are systematically described and illustrated on 33 plates by high-resolution scanning electron microscopy images. Coral reef calcifiers face an uncertain future due to global warming, pollution and coastal development. Foraminifera are prolific producers of reef carbonates, contribute significantly to the reef carbonate budget and are excellent indicators of water quality and reef health. The taxa described in this atlas originate from samples collected in 1992 at depths between 1 and 40 meters and provide a baseline for future studies of environmental change. The large number of species identified also provides a means to assess similarities among biogeographic regions across the Pacific Ocean. This is the first complete survey and documentation of benthic reef foraminifera from Moorea, Society Islands.

ABSTRACT Natural history museums’ (NHMs) primary missions are to collect, curate, and research natural history objects (life, earth, human cultures, and other specimens), and to use them for public education and outreach. The museums have the potential to enhance lifelong science literacy in unique, direct ways based on the collections they house. Ever since 1683, NHMs have exhibited specimens and educated visitors. Now, thousands of NHMs operate across the globe in ~100 countries, but no two of them are alike. Each resembles the others in the primary missions but differs significantly in collection size and diversity, research efforts, staff size and tasks, styles, public displays, outreach, and education. NHMs are thus complicated businesses due to the wide variety of tasks, objectives, and audiences. Collections are the heart of a NHM, for everything depends on them. These collections are all biased for a number of reasons, but none of them could contain an example of every kind of natural history object. The big museums have the oldest and largest collections, while smaller NHMs have mostly local collections. Collections are further biased because only a small part of any of them can be exhibited; hence, specimens with certain attractive characteristics are selected for display and use in education and outreach. Many NHMs use replicas of specimens in occasional displays for a variety of reasons to enhance the visitor experience, chiefly to bring rare or fragile specimens to them. This is all normal and to be expected. The overall outreach aim of NHMs should be to encourage and provide lifelong learning for everyone. People who attend NHMs are mostly educated, and, in Europe and America, chiefly white and middle to upper class. Ethnic or economically disadvantaged groups commonly find NHMs unwelcoming, alienating, and largely irrelevant to their own lives; hence, they make up only a small portion of attendees. In addition, people with physical and mental limitations of mobility, size, sight, hearing, and understanding must be accommodated in NHMs. Museums need to engage these people and to develop programs and exhibits that they will find attractive because these populations will increase in the future. Exciting, stimulating, and engaging exhibits built around the collections of the NHMs can welcome all groups, if the culture and experiences of these people are understood. Sight, touch, sound, and smell are part of a more realistic exhibit and can reinforce the attractiveness of an exhibit. Real objects from the collections, displayed with imagination and creativity focused on the entire population served by the museum, can captivate and welcome people back again and encourage new visitors to attend. Technology should be adopted to complement, not replace, exhibits of actual specimens from the NHM. Perhaps the most important computer technology will be artificial intelligence (AI). This bodes well for the future in planning, organizing, and integrating all aspects of the complicated functioning of a NHM.

ABSTRACT The geology, stratigraphy, and paleontology of the Santa Ana Mountains of Southern California span 150 m.y. of subduction and 30 m.y. of transform faulting, producing complex geologic, stratigraphic, and paleontological settings. The mountains are bounded by the Elsinore fault zone on their east side, uplifting the mountains and tilting them westward, where sediments eroded from them were deposited in a variety of marine to terrestrial environments; most of these formations yield fossils so that a rich history of life can be reconstructed. The most recent geologic history includes the continued transform faulting with displacements of many kilometers northwesterly, juxtaposing separate blocks and biotas. The modern sediments are dominated by the Santa Ana River, which flows westerly at the northern end of the Santa Ana Mountains onto the coastal plain of Orange County. It is the primary aquifer supplying significant amounts of water to the residents. Humans have occupied the region for the last 12,000 yr, developing large, sophisticated populations, which, in the most recent years, have impacted the geology significantly. This field-trip guide starts north of the mountains in Ontario, California, and describes the Elsinore fault zone, the east side of the Santa Ana Mountains, and the ascent of the steep eastern side of those mountains. Extensive vistas of the geology to the east of the mountains can be seen from stops along the way. In the mountains themselves, the guide describes the granitoids of the Peninsular Ranges batholith, sedimentary rocks of the Jurassic Bedford Canyon Formation, rocks of the Cretaceous Santiago Peak Volcanics, and overlying sedimentary rocks of Mesozoic and Cenozoic age. At Ronald W. Caspers Wilderness Park, stops show the early Tertiary Silverado and Santiago formations preserving terrestrial environments that rest unconformably on the marine Cretaceous Williams Formation. On the west side of the mountains, stops at Cretaceous to Miocene conglomerates through mudstones reveal abundant marine mollusks, foraminifera, and vertebrate faunas among others, and a wide variety of sedimentary structures. Younger sediments, faults, and river courses occur along the final leg of the trip from the northern Santa Ana Mountains back to Ontario. Humans have interacted with the geology and its resources for possibly the last 12,000 yr, in ancient times utilizing rock resources and in modern times dealing with geological hazards in developmental and infrastructural construction.

ABSTRACT Summer and winter distribution of foraminifera are similar in Tomales Bay, a long narrow embayment, 64 km north of San Francisco, California. Using three different numerical techniques (cluster analysis, multiple discriminant analysis, and multidimensional scaling), three groups of foraminifera were distinguished. One group including Glabratella ornatissima, Rotorbinella campanulata, and Cribrononion lene characterizes the nearshore turbulent zone near the mouth of the bay, an area of direct marine influence in which wind-driven waves impinge upon the shoreline. Two estuarine groups occupy the bay proper: a middle bay group is composed of Bulimina denudata, Fursenkoina pontoni, Hopkinsina pacifica, Nonionella basispinatus, N. stella, Quinqueloculina ackneriana, and several species of Brizalina; and a group at each end of the bay is composed of Buliminella elegantissima, Buccella tenerrima, Elphidiella hannai, and other less common species. Nearshore turbulent conditions at the northern mouth of the bay grade to estuarine conditions towards the south. Several of the species present in the middle bay group are more characteristic of warmer waters found in southern California and Baja California; these may represent a relict fauna from a time of warmer coastal waters or incursions of species brought by El Nino conditions. In contrast, most species found in the rest of the bay are typical of the colder-water Oregonian Province that reaches from Point Conception in the south to Vancouver Island in the north. The only apparent environmental factor that distinguishes the middle bay from the bay ends is the fine-grained sediment size of the middle bay region. Summer and winter samples showed similar foraminiferal composition and abundance, except in some stations where certain species dominate at one season or the other. The winter middle bay is dominated by Hopkinsina pacifica and Bulimina denudata. Glabratella ornatissima dominated the summer samples in the northernmost turbulent zone at the mouth of the bay.

Catastrophic hypotheses for mass extinctions are commonly criticized because many taxa gradually disappear from the fossil record prior to the extinction. Presumably, a geologically instantaneous catastrophe would not cause a reduction in diversity or a series of minor extinctions before the actual mass extinction. Two types of sampling effects, however, could cause taxa to appear to decline before their actual biotic extinction. The first of these is reduced sample size provided in the sedimentary record and the second, which we examine in greater detail, is artificial range truncation. The fossil record is discontinuous in time and the recorded ranges of species or of higher taxa can only extend to their last known occurrence in the fossil record. If the distribution of last occurrences is random with respect to actual biotic extinction, then apparent extinctions will begin well before a mass extinction and will gradually increase in frequency until the mass extinction event, thus giving the appearance of a gradual extinction. Other factors, such as regressions, can exacerbate the bias toward gradual disappearance of taxa from the fossil record. Hence, gradual extinction patterns prior to a mass extinction do not necessarily eliminate catastrophic extinction hypotheses. The recorded ranges of fossils, especially of uncommon taxa or taxa in habitats not represented by a continuous record, may be inadequate to test either gradual or catastrophic hypotheses.

Abstract Current approaches to foraminiferal paleoecology are based on concepts borrowed from modern ecolcgy. Pioneering studies of the 1930’s (Natland, 1933) showed that many late Neogene species have living representatives which provide a means for deducing paleoecolcgic conditions. This approach was expanded in the 1950’s as knowledge of modern distributional patterns provided empiric models useful in reconstructing marine paleoenvironments. Relationships such as faunal trends in species diversity and abundance, planktic to benthic ratios, abundances of porcelaneous and agglutinated species, species depth hiofacies and the upper depth limits of isobathyal species have been widely applied as paleoecologic tools, especially in estimating paleobathymetry. The use of modern faunal concepts to interpret extinct fossil faunas res s on the assumption that modern distributional patterns are analogous to those of the past and that homeomorphs of modern species, and especially groups of species, had similar environmental adaptations. Furthermore, paleodepth estimates based on living species assume that species depth habitats have not changed with time. While the general correlation of form, structure and environment observed in modern and fossil faunas supports these assumptions, it does not prove them. Recent evidence suggests that deep sea and continental margin species experienced major shifts in depth distribution during the Pleistocene. Similar changes involving both bathymetric migration and evolutionary turnover accompanied middle Tertiary changes in ocean environments and suggest that the present-day distribution patterns have evolved concomitantly with the development of the modern ocean over the last 14 million years.

Abstract Among tropical foraminifers a number of families and genera reach large sizes, commonly ranging from 3 mm 3 in volume to more than 300 mm 3 . Many of these are part of lineages that have extensive fossil records and formulation of an ecological framework for the extant representatives may have applicability to related foraminifers in carbonate deposits as old as Cretaceous and by analogy to the extinct late Paleozoic fusulinaceans. Most large, living foraminiferal genera are associated with a symbiotic photosynthetic partner. Some of these photosynthetic partners are zooxanthellae similar to those in tropical, shallow water, hermatypic corals. Most large foraminifers show one or more type of shell adaptation for the effective utilization of their symbionts. In general, large foraminifers are important constituents of coral reef ecological systems and are geographically limited in their distribution to surface water having temperatures greater than 200C, to shallow shelf areas in the upper part of the photic zone, and to normal (35.5 ppt or higher) salinities. Only a few larger genera, such as the alveolinids, are common in the middle part of the photic zone.

Abstract Planktic foraminifera have been studied in detail for over a hundred years. During this time, they have been useful for biostratigraphic correlation of Cretaceous and younger deep water facies and for paleooceanographic inference. Their paleoecologic utility has been more limited, perhaps because it is based primarily on empirical comparisons of fossils with modern species occurrences. The first planktic species possibly occurred in the Triassic and by the Jurassic, simple globigeriniform species were present in tropical seas. Iterative evolution thereafter produced recurring radiations of high diversity, morphologically complex faunas interspersed with low diversity, morphologically simple faunas. Test morphology can be interpreted as adaptations for main enance of position in the water column, defense against predators, or maintenance of a preferred orientation. Of these, water column positioning is likely to be most critical. Test morphologies may function in relation to density of the foraminiferan and its difference with water, resistance to sinking, and turbulence. The biology and paleobiology of planktic species is poorly known, These foraminifera probably utilize different feeding, reproductive, behavioral, and life history strategies in eutrophic and oligotrophic waters. Mostof these strategies can be inferred from fossils, and therefore have considerable paleoecologic potential. Biogeographic distributions are most commonly used for paleoecology, yet it is very difficult to explain these patterns not only for foraminifera, but for other plankton as well. Six hypotheses are considered. The patterns are not determined by temperature, salinity or circulation alone, nor do they match water mass boundaries wellbecause of mixing along the edges. The idea of “core” ecosystems of more or less fixed biotic structure surrounded by wide ecotones of variable conditions and structure is supported by plankton and foraminiferal evidence. A non-exclusive hypothesis is that environmental stability or lack of it is influential in producing faunal compositions. Bipolar species may be maintained by mixing, coiling directions do not depend on temperature, and distributions on continental shelves are complex but related in general to oceanic water and depth.

Abstract Preservation patterns of calcareous foraminifera on the deep sea floor reflect the state of saturation of the ocean with respect to calcium carbonate, which in turn is a function of overall mixing rate and fertility. Experiments in the field and in the laboratory establish the sequence in which the various species dissolve. The same sequence is evident from seafloor data. The sequence can be used to form dissolution indices. Such indices, as well as other indicators of preservation, e. g. fragmentation, are useful for mapping preservation states and for delineating the preservation stratigraphy in calcareous pelagic sediments. Preservation stratigraphy is an excellent tool for stratigraphic correlation and contains clues to the changing chemistry and fertility of the ocean. Acoustic reflectors in carbonate sequences are closely tied to preservation fluctuations.

Abstract The isotopic composition of foraminiferal shells (oxygen, carbon) holds the key to a number of central problems in paleoceanography, such as paleotemperature determination, discovery of the nature of the age cycles, and the evolution of climate and circulation during the last 100 million years. The Pleistocene cyclicity appears tied to the Milankovitchmechanism; however, the peculiar shape of the 100,000 year “saw-tooth” cycle calls for certain feedback mechanisms. In particular, the deglaciation events suggest strong positive feedback, which may derive from salinity stratification of the ocean. There is evidence for such stratification during the last deglaciation. The Tertiary oxygen isotope stratigraphy indicates an overall cooling trend for high latitudes, while the tropics tend to stay warm. During the Eocene high latitudes were characterized by (isotopically light) low salinity surface waters. During the Neogene, a strong thermocline developed, and confined the vertical mixing of upper waters to privileged regions including upwelling areas. The steplike transitions in isotope stratigraphy (Eocene- Oligocene, Cretaceous-Tertiary) are of fundamental importance in the avolution of climate and of life.

Abstract Perhaps no fossil group is used as much as foraminifera for paleoecologic inference, both in academia and industry. Since the late 1960s, new concepts and much additional data have appeared that make it difficult for the casual worker not immediately concerned with foraminiferal ecology and paleoecology to stay abreast of the latest developments. In these notes, the authors summarize much of that information, or provide reference to more detailed sources. They also attempt to point out problems and other methods of dealing with them. Most paleoecologic work with foraminifera in the past has relied on direct comparison of fossil assemblages with the most similar modern assemblages, and inferring then that the environments were similar also. The method is used widely in scientific studies and in industrial applications. The result is based on the single hypothesis that the fossils are environmentally analogous to their modern counterparts. These notes present a number of alternative working hypotheses, and in some cases, examine the data to attempt of disprove them.