About CODI

Funding

In 2011 the United States’ National Science Foundation‘s Program in Biological Anthropology provided funding for BCS 1025263 to Leslea Hlusko and Jackson Njau in support of the grant Vertebrate Paleontology at Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania.

Research Aims

There were three components to this grant.  The first was to compile a database of all of the vertebrate fossil material recovered from Olduvai Gorge and make this freely and easily available to scientists, the public, and the Tanzanian government.  This database, CODI, is intended to facilitate research, improve the public’s ability to understand the process of paleontological science, and help the Tanzanian government to regain control over a fossil assemblage scattered over the last 100 years by numerous scientists from all over the world.

The second component was to continue field research at Olduvai Gorge, exploring the outcrops and systematically collecting vertebrate fossil material in order to increase and improve the assemblage from this unique window into the African landscape over the last 2 million years. Please visit the OVPP page to learn more.

The third component was outreach, to support K-12 teacher workshops at the National Natural History Museum in Arusha, Tanzania.  Please visit the Education: Teacher Workshops page to learn more.

Acknowledgements

CODI project directors L. Hlusko and J. Njau are grateful to NSF for funding this project, COSTECH and the Tanzanian Department of Antiquities for research permission; Steven Bernard, Dr. Ray Bernor, Dr. Faysal Bibi, Marianne Brasil, Dr. Agness Gidna, Nima Hejazi, Michael Holmes, Prisca Isidory, Sarah Kendall,  Jackson Kihiyo, Dr. Amandus Kweka, Dr. Paul Msemwa, John Paresso, Whitney B. Reiner, Dr. Antoine Souron, and Mallory Watkins, for assistance compiling the database; RHOI for the Filemaker database upon which CODI was modeled; M. Black for assistance with creating the database structure and exporting it to the website; HERC and the F. C. Howell library for research assistance; and T. White and A. VanRooy for project support.