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Comment on "Lethally hot temperatures during the Early Triassic greenhouse"
N Goudemand1, C Romano, A Brayard
1Palaeontological Institute and Museum, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland. goudemand@pim.uzh.ch
Science (New York, N.Y.)
|March 2, 2013
Summary
Revisiting Permian to Middle Triassic seawater temperatures, this study found that corrected data no longer supports previous claims of "lethally hot" conditions causing organism "eclipses". The findings challenge established paleoclimate interpretations.
Area of Science:
- Paleoclimatology
- Marine Biology
- Geological Time Scales
Background:
- Previous research by Sun et al. suggested a correlation between high Permian-Triassic seawater temperatures and organism extinctions.
- The original study proposed an equatorial
Purpose of the Study:
- To re-evaluate the temporal positioning and interpretation of Permian to Middle Triassic equatorial seawater temperature data.
- To assess the validity of the link between reconstructed temperatures and proposed organismal
Main Methods:
- Correction of temporal positioning for existing paleotemperature data points.
- Reanalysis of temperature trends and their relationship to biological events.
Main Results:
- Corrected data points do not support the previously assumed temperature trends.
- The proposed direct relationship between "lethally hot" seawater and organismal "eclipse" is not substantiated by the re-analyzed data.
Conclusions:
- The original interpretation of Permian-Triassic thermal stress on equatorial marine life is unsupported by the corrected data.
- Further research is needed to understand the drivers of Permian-Triassic biological changes.
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