Huge pulses of volcanic activity are likely to have played a key role in triggering the end-Triassic mass extinction, which set the scene for the age of the dinosaurs, according to new research. Dr Jessica Whiteside, Associate Professor of Geochemistry at the University of Southampton, worked with colleagues from Oxford and Exeter Universities to trace the global impact of major volcanic gas emissions and their link to the end of the Triassic Period. The findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS, DOI 10.1073/pnas.1705378114) directly link volcanism to the previously observed repeated large emissions of carbon dioxide that had a profound impact on the global climate, causing the mass extinction at the end of the Triassic Period, as well as slowing the recovery of life afterwards. Read more
A million-year-long period of extreme volcanic activity most likely paved the way for the dawn of the dinosaurs, a study suggests. Scientists have analysed ancient rocks and have found traces of emissions from huge volcanic eruptions that happened about 200 million years ago. This would have led to one of the largest mass extinctions on record, enabling dinosaurs to become dominant. Read more
Volcanic eruptions triggered dawn of the dinosaurs
Researchers from the Oxford University Department of Earth Science worked in collaboration with the Universities of Exeter and Southampton to trace the global impact of major volcanic gas emissions and their link to the end of the Triassic period. The findings link volcanism to the previously observed repeated large emissions of carbon dioxide that had a profound impact on the global climate, causing the mass extinction at the end of the Triassic Period, as well as slowing the recovery of animal life afterwards. The Triassic extinction took place approximately 200 million years ago, and was proceeded by the dinosaur era. One of the largest mass extinctions of animal life on record, the casualty list includes large crocodile-like reptiles and several marine invertebrates. The event also caused huge changes in land vegetation, and while it remains a mystery why the dinosaurs survived this event, they went on to fill the vacancies left by the now extinct wildlife species, alongside early mammals and amphibians. This mass extinction has long been linked to a large and abrupt release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, but the exact source of this emission has been unknown. Read more
The mass extinction that wiped out many species at the end of the Triassic period some 200 million years ago made way for the dinosaurs' domination of Earth for the next 135 million years. Now, researchers have determined the timing of a possible trigger for that Triassic extinction event with unprecedented precision. Read more
Megavolcanoes Tied to Pre-Dinosaur Mass Extinction
Scientists examining evidence across the world from New Jersey to North Africa say they have linked the abrupt disappearance of half of earth's species 200 million years ago to a precisely dated set of gigantic volcanic eruptions. The eruptions may have caused climate changes so sudden that many creatures were unable to adapt - possibly on a pace similar to that of human-influenced climate warming today. The extinction opened the way for dinosaurs to evolve and dominate the planet for the next 135 million years, before they, too, were wiped out in a later planetary cataclysm. Read more
The shifting face of a 200-million-year-old mystery
Five times in the last half a billion years, tremendous, global-scale extinctions have wiped out a significant fraction of life on Earth - and each of them presents a grand puzzle. The most recent and the most familiar is the extinction that wiped out the dinosaurs - between the Cretaceous and Tertiary periods, about 65 million years ago. But before that, 205 million years ago, was the "End-Triassic Event" - it set the stage for the Jurassic Period, which saw the rise to prominence of the dinosaurs. Just what happened that killed off half the species on the planet, though, remains a mystery. Read more
The Triassic-Jurassic extinction event marks the boundary between the Triassic and Jurassic periods, 199.6 million years ago, and is one of the major extinction events of the Phanerozoic eon, profoundly affecting life on land and in the oceans. Read more