Steinthorsdottir, M, Elliott-Kingston, C and Bacon, KL orcid.org/0000-0002-8944-5107 (2018) Cuticle surfaces of fossil plants as a potential proxy for volcanic SO₂ emissions: observations from the Triassic–Jurassic transition of East Greenland. Palaeobiodiversity and Palaeoenvironments, 98 (1). pp. 49-69. ISSN 1867-1594
Abstract
Flood basalt volcanism has been implicated in several episodes of mass extinctions and environmental degradation in the geological past, including at the Triassic–Jurassic (Tr–J) transition, through global warming caused by massive outgassing of carbon dioxide. However, the patterns of biodiversity loss observed are complicated and sometimes difficult to reconcile with the effects of global warming alone. Recently, attention has turned to additional volcanic products as potential aggravating factors, in particular sulphur dioxide (SO₂). SO₂ acts both directly as a noxious environmental pollutant and indirectly through forming aerosols in the atmosphere, which may cause transient global dimming and cooling. Here, we present a range of morphological changes to fossil plant leaf cuticle surfaces of hundreds of Ginkgoales and Bennettitales specimens across the Tr–J boundary of East Greenland. Our results indicate that morphological structures of distorted cuticles near the Tr–J boundary are consistent with modern cuticle SO₂-caused damage and supported by recent leaf-shape SO₂ proxy results, thus identifying cuticle surface morphology as a potentially powerful proxy for SO₂. Recording the timing and duration of SO₂ emissions in the past may help distinguish between the driving agents responsible for mass extinction events and thus improve our understanding of the Earth System.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © The Author(s) 2017. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. |
Keywords: | Fossil plant cuticle; Sulphur dioxide; End-Triassic mass extinction; Camp; Ginkgoales; Bennettitales; SO2 proxy; Flood basalt volcanism; Triassic–Jurassic boundary |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 03 Oct 2017 11:15 |
Last Modified: | 23 Jun 2023 22:36 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Springer Verlag |
Identification Number: | 10.1007/s12549-017-0297-9 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:121981 |