CHRONOS Database Section

NEPTUNE database: developed at the ETH Zürich, currently hosted by CHRONOS. It contains quality-controlled, micropaleontology and stratigraphy data from DSDP-ODP for taxonomic and evolution studies (mainly Cenozoic). Tools include graphic correlation.

NEPTUNE is a relational database of microfossil occurrences reported in DSDP and ODP samples. NEPTUNE contains the occurrences of more than 9000 plankton species names (nannofossils, foraminifera, diatoms, and radiolarians) in Cenozoic and Mesozoic samples of more than 300 DSDP and ODP drillholes from all ocean basins.

Search Neptune

Most of the data in NEPTUNE are contained in four basic data tables:

1. Bug data (individual microfossil records in individual samples, based on range-charts in Initial Reports of the DSDP and Scientific Reports of the ODP);

2.Taxonomy (all species names reported in DSDP sites and selected ODP sites with synonymies);

3. Age models (age assignment for each sample based on individual age/depth plots);

4. Biogeography (species names reported in each DSDP hole and selected ODP holes).

The NEPTUNE database project was initiated in 1990 when a group of biostratigraphers at the ETH Zürich started compiling stratigraphic information of DSDP holes for macroevolutionary studies in the Cenozoic. In its initial stage it was conceived and led by Dave Lazarus in collaboration with some veterans from the DSDP (Jean-Pierre Beckmann, Katharina von Salis, Hans Thierstein) and ETH staff and students (Milena Biolzi, Jörg Bollmann, Heinz Hilbrecht, Cinzia Cervato). A series of conceptual publications describing NEPTUNE appeared during that time (Lazarus, 1992; Lazarus, 1994), and after 5 years the technical phase resulted in a stratigraphic synthesis for Neogene sediments from 94 DSDP holes (Lazarus et al., 1995). The numerical age models, upon which NEPTUNE was based, followed the chronology of Berggren et al. (1985a and b) and included magnetochronology, calcareous nannofossils, planktonic foraminifera, radiolaria and diatoms. This collection of age models, together with the necessary applications for Macintosh Computers (Age-Depth Plot Program ADP 1.0) is on-line available at the National Geophysical Data Center (click here).

Between 1995 and 1999, the project entered a scientific analysis phase, during which NEPTUNE was exploited for macroevolutionary studies of the oceanic plankton in the Cenozoic. These investigations included topics like species richness, species evenness, longevity, speciation- and extinction-rates, biogeography, migration and studies on synchrony and diachrony of nannofossils, foraminifers, diatoms, radiolaria) in the Cenozoic. This work was done by Cinzia Cervato, Bernard Brabec, Heinz Hilbrecht, and Hans Thierstein, who have re-calibrated all existing age models in NEPTUNE to the new integrated chronology, that just had appeared at that time (Berggren et al., 1995). Spencer-Cervato (1999) revised age models, included more recent ones from ODP holes and so extended the NEPTUNE database, and described the NEPTUNE database in detail in Palaeontologia Electronica (click here)

At about the same time, the Natural History Museum in Basel (NMB), who runs one of the Micropaleontological Reference Centers for the DSDP and ODP, became interested in using NEPTUNE and the age model collection in order to have an efficient tool to date the large number of DSDP and ODP samples in their collections. Collaboration between the ETH group and the NMB (Michael Knappertsbusch), who continued compiling stratigraphic information from the range charts of the Initial and Scientific Reports of the DSDP and ODP. The ongoing work resulted in a collection of numerical age models covering holes of the DSDP and the ODP up to Leg 175, that are all magnetically calibrated against the chronology of Berggren et al. (1995). Next to the basic four planktonic microfossil groups (i.e. calcareous nannofossils, planktic foraminifera, diatoms and radiolaria) other other useful stratigraphical markers were integrated, such as bolboforma, O-isotopes, Sr-isotopes, new magnetic events, so that more refined age models can be produced. The close collaboration between the NMB and the ETH group eventually led to the installation of the NEPTUNE server at ETH Zürich, so that the relational database NEPTUNE and the age models are online available to the scientific community.

In 2004 and 2005, Mark Leckie and Kendra Clark (UMass Amherst), and Cinzia Cervato considerably expanded Neptune by adding Mesozoic data for selected DSDP and ODP sites as well as data from recent ODP holes.

Dave B. Lazarus at the Humboldt Museum, Berlin, initiated and designed NEPTUNE. Information on the data contained in NEPTUNE can be obtained from Cinzia Cervato (cinzia@iastate.edu). For information on the new data schema and search routines, please contact Pat Diver at divdat@aol.com