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Vernon is developing and evaluating a new sub-model of herbivore consumption for
the Sheffield Dynamic Global Vegetation Model (SDGVM), using
data and published evidence from the scientific literature.
But a working model is only the beginning. Ultimately, he
will be investigating how herbivore consumption of plant material
impacts on vegetation structure at the global scale, and vice
versa. Do large herbivorous mammals (megaherbivores) promote
and sustain the grassland ‘superbiome’?
This work will focus on the modern and pre-industrial worlds,
but also on intervals in the geological past. One important
question Vernon will tackle concerns the extinction of megaherbivore
communities after the last ice age. To what extent was the
loss of grasslands following deglaciation the result of large
mammal extinctions? A second question concerns the origin
of C4 grasslands in the Miocene – did the evolution
of grazing in large mammals contribute to the rapid shift
from forested to open vegetation at this time?
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Until the end of 2005, Vernon worked on the impacts
of elephants on vegetation in the Kruger National Park,
South Africa. Africa was the only continent where communities
of large herbivorous mammals survived the end-Pleistocene
mass extinction event largely intact. Today, these communities
have major impacts on vegetation structure through the
consumption of foliage and, especially in the case of
African elephants, physical damage to plants. |
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