Sampling bias and the fossil record of planktonic foraminifera on land and in the deep sea

Large-scale trends in planktonic foraminiferal diversity have so far been based on utilization of synoptic biostratigraphic range charts. Although this approach ensures the taxonomic consistency and quality of the data being used, it takes no formal account of any sampling biases that might exist in the fossil record. We demonstrate that the occurrence data of planktonic foraminifera, as recorded in the primary literature, are strongly biased by sampling. We do this by demonstrating that raw diversity curves derived from the land-based and deep-sea records are strikingly different, but that they each correlate with the intensity of sampling in their respective environments, and thus are ultimately controlled by the structure of the geological record in each setting. Because sampling of the Mesozoic record is best in our land record whereas sampling of the Cenozoic is best in our deep-sea record, we combine the two to generate the best-supported estimates of species and genus diversity o...