Paleoecological indicators are examined as to their accuracy in reconstructing past biotic communities and environmental conditions, their utility in answering important questions about such communities and conditions, and the temporal and spatial scales over which they are effective. Next, environmental problems susceptible of paleoecological analysis are considered, as are the ecosystem and l...

The causes of megafaunal extinctions in North America have been widely debated but remain poorly understood. Mammoths (Mammuthus spp.) in the American Southwest were hunted by Clovis people during a period of rapid climate change, just before the regional onset of Younger Dryas cooling and mammoth extirpation. Thus, these mammoths may provide key insights into late Pleistocene extinction proces...

VALENTÍ RULL,∗†† TERESA VEGAS-VILARRÚBIA,† SANDRA NOGUÉ,∗‡ AND OTTO HUBER§∗∗ ∗CSIC-Botanic Institute of Barcelona, Palynology & Paleoecology, Pg. del Migdia s/n, 08038 Barcelona, Spain †University of Barcelona, Department of Ecology, Av. Diagonal 645, 08028 Barcelona, Spain ‡Autonomous University of Barcelona, Department of Animal Biology, Plant Biology and Ecology, Campus Bellaterra, 08193 Bar...

Organisms are extremely sensitive to many parameters of the physical environment, and their fossil remains may thus be used in the interpretation of ancient environments. Effective use of paleoecology depends on first determining what environmental parameters are of interest. Second, developing a model based on recent examples which can be tested on the fossil record, and third, testing the mod...