1,721,083 research outputs found
Orbitally forced climate change in the late mid-Eocene time at Blake Nose (Leg 171B): evidence from stable isotopes in foraminifera
No full textIntroduction: Creteous-Paleogene climatic evolution of the western North Atlantic, results from ODP Leg 171B, Blake Nose
No full text., Mid-Eocene deep water, the Late Palaeogene Thermal Maximum and continental slope mass wasting during the CretaceouPalaeogene impact
No full textTesting the Cretaceous greenhouse hypothesis using glassy foraminiferal calcite from the core of the Turonian tropics on Demerara Rise
No full textGlassy Turonian foraminifera preserved in clay-rich sediments from the western tropical Atlantic yield the warmest equivalent δ18O sea-surface temperatures (SSTs) yet reported for the entire Cretaceous-Cenozoic. We estimate Turonian SSTs that were at least as warm as (conservative mean ~30 °C) to significantly warmer (warm mean ~33 °C) than those in the region today. However, if independent evidence for high middle Cretaceous pCO2 is reliable and resulted in greater isotopic fractionation between seawater and calcite because of lower sea-surface pH, our conservative and warm SST estimates would be even higher (32 and 36 °C, respectively). Our new tropical SSTs help reconcile geologic data with the predictions of general circulation models that incorporate high Cretaceous pCO2 and lend support to the hypothesis of a Cretaceous greenhouse. Our data also strengthen the case for a Turonian age for the Cretaceous thermal maximum and highlight a 20–40 m.y. mismatch between peak Cretaceous-Cenozoic global warmth and peak inferred tectonic CO2 production. We infer that this mismatch is either an artifact of a hidden Turonian pulse in global ocean-crust cycling or real evidence of the influence of some other factor on atmospheric CO2 and/or SSTs. A hidden pulse in crust cycling would explain the timing of peak Cretaceous-Cenozoic sea level (also Turonian), but other factors are needed to explain high-frequency (~10–100 k.y.) instability in middle Cretaceous SSTs reported elsewhere
Letter to Nature. Warm tropical ocean surface and global anoxia during the mid-Cretaceous period
No full textThe middle of the Cretaceous period (about 120 to 80 Myr ago) was a time of unusually warm polar temperatures, repeated reef-drowning in the tropics and a series of oceanic anoxic events (OAEs) that promoted both the widespread deposition of organic-carbon-rich marine sediments and high biological turnover. The cause of the warm temperatures is unproven but widely attributed to high levels of atmospheric greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide. In contrast, there is no consensus on the climatic causes and effects of the OAEs, with both high biological productivity and ocean 'stagnation' being invoked as the cause of ocean anoxia. Here we show, using stable isotope records from multiple species of well-preserved foraminifera, that the thermal structure of surface waters in the western tropical Atlantic Ocean underwent pronounced variability about 100 Myr ago, with maximum sea surface temperatures 3–5 °C warmer than today. This variability culminated in a collapse of upper-ocean stratification during OAE-1d (the 'Breistroffer' event), a globally significant period of organic-carbon burial that we show to have fundamental, stratigraphically valuable, geochemical similarities to the main OAEs of the Mesozoic era. Our records are consistent with greenhouse forcing being responsible for the warm temperatures, but are inconsistent both with explanations for OAEs based on ocean stagnation, and with the traditional view (reviewed in ref. 12) that past warm periods were more stable than today's climate
Symbiont 'bleaching' in planktic foraminifera during the Middle Eocene Climatic Optimum
Full text linkMany genera of modern planktic foraminifera are adapted to nutrient-poor (oligotrophic) surface waters by hosting photosynthetic symbionts, but it is unknown how they will respond to future changes in ocean temperature and acidity. Here we show that ca. 40 Ma, some fossil photosymbiont-bearing planktic foraminifera were temporarily ‘bleached’ of their symbionts coincident with transient global warming during the Middle Eocene Climatic Optimum (MECO). At Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) Sites 748 and 1051 (Southern Ocean and mid-latitude North Atlantic, respectively), the typically positive relationship between the size of photosymbiont-bearing planktic foraminifer tests and their carbon isotope ratios (?13C) was temporarily reduced for ?100 k.y. during the peak of the MECO. At the same time, the typically photosymbiont-bearing planktic foraminifera Acarinina suffered transient reductions in test size and relative abundance, indicating ecological stress. The coincidence of minimum ?18O values and reduction in test size–?13C gradients suggests a link between increased sea-surface temperatures and bleaching during the MECO, although changes in pH and nutrient availability may also have played a role. Our findings show that host-photosymbiont interactions are not constant through geological time, with implications for both the evolution of trophic strategies in marine plankton and the reliability of geochemical proxy records generated from symbiont-bearing planktic foraminifera
Transient ocean warming and shifts in carbon reservoirs during the early Danian
No full textThe Palaeocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) at 55 Ma marks the Palaeocene/Eocene (P/E) boundary and represents a discrete period of abrupt, transient global warming. There are few vegetation records from within the PETM and such an absence of data prevents modelling of the vegetation response to climate warming. Outcrops exposing the Sentinel Butte member (upper Fort Union Formation) and the Golden Valley Formation (Bear Den and lower Camels Butte members) within the Williston Basin of western North Dakota, USA are known to span the P/E boundary. Pollen and spore floras at the Farmers Butte locality (Stark County, North Dakota; 46.92° N 102.11° W) record changes in abundance of some reed, fern and understorey plants across the Sentinel Butte–Bear Den contact but no other composition changes occur until the arrival of Eocene immigrants Platycarya spp. (walnut/pecan family) and Intratriporopollenites instructus (linden/sterculia/cotton tree families) at the top of the Bear Den member, c. 11 m above the change in co-occurrence and relative abundance patterns of range-through taxa. The exact stratigraphic level at which these Eocene marker taxa first occur is unclear owing to the heavily weathered nature of Bear Den strata below the Alamo Bluff lignite. This pattern of stratigraphic change may be correlative to the well documented “floral gap” of PETM records in Wyoming. Though bulk ?13Corg ratios decrease by 2.4‰ across the Alamo Bluff lignite, degradation of organic carbon within the upper Bear Den member partially masks full expression of the carbon isotope excursion associated with the PETM. Hence, strata around the Alamo Bluff lignite may represent a new terrestrial record of the PETM. In agreement with terrestrial PETM records from other U.S. western interior localities, palynological data indicate no floral extinction and little composition change across the Palaeocene/Eocene boundary. <br/
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