DeepDive: estimating global biodiversity patterns through time using deep learning

Understanding how biodiversity has changed through time is a central goal of evolutionary biology. However, estimates of past biodiversity are challenged by the inherent incompleteness of the fossil record, even when state-of-the-art statistical methods are applied to adjust estimates while correcting for sampling biases. Here we develop an approach based on stochastic simulations of biodiversity and a deep learning model to infer richness at global or regional scales through time while incorporating spatial, temporal and taxonomic sampling variation. Our method outperforms alternative approaches across simulated datasets, especially at large spatial scales, providing robust palaeodiversity estimates under a wide range of preservation scenarios. We apply our method on two empirical datasets of different taxonomic and temporal scope: the Permian–Triassic recovery and the cyclic evolution of proboscideans. Our estimates provide a revised quantitative assessment of two mass extinctions in the marine record and reveal rapid diversification of proboscideans following their expansion out of Africa and a greater than 70% diversity drop in the Pleistocene.

Rebecca B. Cooper, Joseph T. Flannery-Sutherland, Daniele Silvestro