thesis biodiversity visualization in the course of time
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ThesisBiodiversity Visualizationin the Course of Time
Professor Dr. Renato Pajarola
Visualization and Multimedia Lab
Department of Informatics
University of Zurich
1
Introduction
Since the initial formation of our planetapproximately 4.5 billion years ago, earthhas undergone drastic changes. The firstlife is currently though to have appearedapproximately 3.5 billion years ago, which,through the process of evolution, has dif-ferentiated into a tremendous amount oftaxonomic diversity and a wide variety oforganisms. However, this process has notbeen a linear, since evolution is naturallyinfluenced by outside factors such as cli-mate, plate tectonics and unique events.As such, it is observed that phases of
Ratite species distribution in the modernworld caused by tectonic plate motion. [1]
mass-extinction (decrease of biodiversity)are often followed by phases radiation (in-crease of biodiversity in a clade) of a newclade [2, 3]. A well-known example ofsuch an event would be the Cretaceous-Tertiary mass-extinction which terminatedthe domination of reptiles (e.g. dinosaurs)and lead to the radiation of mammals whohad an evolutionary advantage in the cool-ing environment of that epoch due to theirfur.
Assignment
In this thesis / project, you goal is toimplement a web application which allowsthe user to visualize and investigate this”course of the world” in regards to its bio-diversity. The final visualization shouldallow the user to scrub through the 4.5billion years, see the tectonic constellationas well as the corresponding biodiversitybased on a dynamic tree of life visualiza-tion. Additional interactions of investigat-ing the current view can be establishedresulting in a rich visualization of how lifeevolved though time and space on ourplanet.
In the course of action, you will haveto go through a complete data visual-ization workflow, starting with the datacleaning and aggregation, storing the datain a suitable setup such as a database, andfinally implementing a visualization webapplication which allows the interactiveexploration of the biodiversity through thegeological ages.The initial dataset is provided, but ad-ditional data may be added during theproject to enrich the visualization, suchas climate data, special unique events,
more species, etc.
Project Type
This project can be a bachelor thesisor master thesis through adjusting thetasks and goals.
Requirements
The implementation will be in Pythonfor the data processing and the backend(in Flask) of the visualization. Preferablyyou have taken the courses Data Visual-ization Concepts (or/and) Data Visualiza-tion Analysis. The frontend will be imple-mented in JavaScript. Fluency in Pythonis a must, prior knowledge of fundamen-tal Python libraries (Pandas, NumPy etc.)is helpful but can be learned during theproject. Different technologies can be dis-cussed.
Work Load
• 20% Theory• 60% Implementation• 20% Test
Supervision
Prof. Dr. Renato PajarolaGaudenz Halter (assistant)
Contact
Write an Email to [email protected] tohave a chat about the project if you areinterested.
References[1] Florian Maderspacher. Evolution: Flight of
the ratites. Current Biology, 27(3):110–113,2017.
[2] James T. Stroud and Jonathan B. Losos.Ecological opportunity and adaptive radia-tion. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution,and Systematics, 47(1):507–532, 2016.
[3] Ay Zhuravlev and Robert Riding. The ecologyof the cambrian radiation. Eos, 82(24), 2001.