Wednesday 30 September 2015

Conclusion


Conclusion: Could tectonics control biodiversity?

Tectonics not only destroys life but it creates it. The creation, alteration and destruction of new ecological niches instigate changes in both biotic and abiotic variables. Changes in abiotic variables such as precipitation, sunlight, pH, temperature, nutrient availability, salinity, wind, and available oxygen occurs as a result of climatic change. Processes in the geosphere e.g. tectonic movement, which affects the flow of the hydrosphere and the atmosphere, can instigate this climatic change. The nature of both ocean and atmospheric flow regimes regulate the climate in both marine and terrestrial environments so as they change the climate changes too. Uplifting topography or closing and opening of seaways can have massive implications on the hydrosphere. Tectonics can also facilitate the eruption of magma, which has major implications on the hydrosphere as demonstrated by some of the examples previously discussed in our blog (Siberian Traps). We have seen throughout our previous blog posts that ecosystems have had and still have complex relationships and responses to major tectonic events.

Tectonics is presumably responsible for the generation of our early earth atmosphere, which protects us from short wave radiation from the sun. Igneous processes release gases such as CO2, CH4, and H2O. These gases are major constituents of earth’s atmosphere. CO2 was abundant from magmatic processes because carbon is incompatible with silicate minerals. Carbon dioxide is therefore left out of the crystallisation processes so are extruded in a gaseous form. Water is also incompatible with silicate minerals so are erupted as steam. In the past, after it was capable of cooling it was able to condense and form a liquid, which allowed the establishment of significant volumes of water on earths surface e.g. oceans. The oceans were unable to previously form because abundant magmatic processes kept earth to hot so restricted water to existing only as a vapour. Tectonic action also supports the idea that life developed in the oceans and moved onto more stable crust supposedly generated by plate collision. These are important examples of how tectonics established suitable conditions to found the formation of life. 

Hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorous and sulphur are the elements that support the basic chemistry of all life. Prof. Tilman Spohn believes that tectonics could be accountable for the replenishment of nutrients to the top surface.  All the nutrients that support primitive life on the top surface have to be replenished somehow or the top surface will become depleted. The nutrient cycling that occurs in conjunction with action in the geosphere could be partially responsible for that. For example the recycling of carbon (carbon cycle) from the atmosphere through the processes of subduction and related volcanism could mean that without tectonics a crucial link in the carbon cycle is gone. Also the high temperatures on Venus are assumed to be a result of the lack of tectonics, which has given rise to the greenhouse effect.  Could this be the reason behind the presumed absence of life on Venus?

With all these variables important to life and their partial dependency on tectonics and/or tectonics related processes, could the creation of suitable conditions for life be a function of tectonics? If so, it may not be wrong to assume that life could not be possible without tectonics.

Josephine Turnbull & Rosie Hebden


P - T Extinction


Are the Siberian traps one of Earths biggest killers?

The end Permian or Permian-Triassic mass extinction around 252mya, is marked by distinct losses of biodiversity in both terrestrial and marine realms.  An estimated 52% of all families went extinct, with 96% of all marine species and 70% of all terrestrial species such as insects; plants and vertebrates vanished in a geological instant. The marine realm had significant loss of suspension feeders and carnivores (bryozoan, crinoids, brachiopods and foraminifera) and almost all the reef dwellers. It remains the largest mass extinction event recorded in Earths history. Much like the Cambrian explosion the Permian-Triassic (P-T) mass extinction is still being debated today as there is still not one universally excepted hypothesis.

There is evidence that a negative stable carbon isotope excursion of 3‰ - 6 was roughly synchronous with the mass extinction suggesting a major shift in the global carbon cycle. Proposed mechanisms of this excursion include the reduction of primary productivity, oxidation of sedimentary organic matter, volcanic degassing, burning of forests, outbursts of methane from methane hydrates or a combination of all these processes. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas and has a long average lifetime in the atmosphere, it has the ability to accumulate over periods of time and increase the average global temperature as it absorbs long wave radiation. Nonetheless, this carbon isotope shift is indicative of either a global drop in photosynthesis or global warming, or even both. A drop in photosynthesis expresses a lack of carbon fixation by plants and a disruption to the biosphere. This is exhibited by the lack of coal beds for around 6mya afterward. Ultimately less carbon dioxide was extracted from the atmosphere causing further increases in the global temperature. But what could cause a drop in photosynthesis?



Carbon excursion on the P-Tr boundary

All organisms have a tolerance to certain environmental conditions they are able to live in. Abiotic factors such as temperature, salinity, nutrient input, soil, precipitation and in particular sunlight availability for photosynthetic organisms, affect whether an organism will be able to survive in an environment. A drop in photosynthesis across the P-T boundary demonstrates that the abiotic environment has undergone changes, which have resulted in the significant loss of photosynthesizing organisms. It could have been changes that the organisms were intolerant to e.g. high temperatures or less light may have been penetrating to the surface because of volcanic emissions. This drop in primary productivity in the biosphere means animals higher up the food chain become susceptible to changes in the food supply as the number of phytoplankton and land plants decrease.


In conjunction with the increase in CO2 and drop in photosynthesis there is also evidence for abnormally high ocean and air temperatures, ocean acidification and widespread ocean anoxia. These changes can come in association with the rapid addition of greenhouse gases. So what could cause a rapid addition of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere over a short geological time period?



Links between the atmosphere, hydrosphere, and biosphere showing ocean acidification


It is a known fact that there is a strong correlation between continental flood basalts and mass extinctions. Three of the largest mass extinctions recorded in Earth’s history strangely coincide with large outpourings of basaltic magma in a continental flood basalt regime (CFB). The Permian-Triassic extinction was synchronous with the Siberian Traps, the Triassic-Jurassic extinction with the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province and the Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction with the Deccan Traps. Is this pure chance?

Paleogeography of the end-Permian

The eruption of the Siberian Traps is associated with or possibly promoted by rifting (east-west extension) of the West Siberian Basin during the Permian-Early Triassic. The magma is thought to be associated with a hot mantle plume and the decompression melting that occurs as you decrease the lithostatic load over an area during a rifting event. Eruptions of the Siberian Traps began roughly 300,000 years before the P-T boundary and occurred during and after the mass extinction. Enough magma was erupted to cover an area the size of the United States with magma kilometres thick. Approximately two-thirds of this magma erupted during and prior to the P-T boundary with the remainder erupting during the following 500,000 years. Radiometric dating suggests the eruptions continued for around 1mya, which fits the hypothesis of rapid addition of greenhouse gases to our atmosphere. Because as magma erupts it brings to the surface gases that are incompatible with silicate minerals e.g. CO2and H2O, so they get released into the atmosphere. Extensive volcanism over a short period could therefore explain the CO2 excursions. The rising of magma could also have induced the release of methane from methane hydrates or the evoking of polar gas hydrate release in permafrost regions due to earth warming. 

The eruption of the Siberian Traps and release of a high volume of greenhouse gases is thought to have had runoff effects in the atmosphere, hydrosphere and the biosphere. The uptake of atmospheric greenhouse gases CO2 causes ocean acidification and the amount of CO2 has particular controls on whether calcite will be precipitated or dissolved.



Equilibrium equation for the precipitation and dissolution of calcite or aragonite


The addition of CH4 and CO2 also produces acid rain when it reacts with water.  The warmer temperatures accelerate the hydrological cycle, which causes a greater amount of corrosion on land and nutrient runoff into surrounding shallow waters. Sufficient nutrient input causes primary production in the photic zone to increase. As the primary producers die and fall to the bottom of the ocean, bacteria begin to deplete available oxygen as they decompose organic material. Over time this leads to the formation of an oxygen minimum zone and anoxic deeper waters. Its likely that ocean warming weakened the thermal gradient within oceans leading to a more stratified ocean which further accentuated the absence of oxygen in deeper waters due to a lack of overturning. Ocean warming makes it easier to achieve anoxic states because warm water has a lower capacity to hold dissolved oxygen. During an anoxic event, if certain bacteria are consuming organic matter in the absence of oxygen they produce a toxic gas H2S (hydrogen sulphide). In certain concentrations most organisms can tolerate small quantities of H2S but if concentrations pass a certain threshold then it becomes toxic. It is suggested by some that the widespread anoxia caused immense volumes of H2S gas to bubble out of the ocean and contribute to the Permian-Triassic extinction.

Current understandings of ecosystems proves that a lot of organisms can’t adapt quickly enough to severe shifts in environmental conditions. And if they do organisms can only withstand a certain threshold when eventually conditions become unliveable or toxic. The simultaneous episodes of mass extinction and global warming during the end-Permian give strong evidence to the collapse of both marine and terrestrial ecosystems being somewhat associated with the carbon excursion. The producer of greenhouse gases in the end-Permian must have had the ability to produce copious volumes of CH4 and in particular CO2. The Siberian Traps most likely had the capacity to do that. Other hypothesis swaying from the Siberian Traps include the assemblage of the supercontinent Pangaea. It’s thought that a multitude of shallow marine basins, which was the dominant habitat for most marine invertebrates, were destroyed when the continents moved together and as this was happening ocean currents were channeled and deflected. Thus changing the ocean circulation and therefore regional climate systems. This altered the net primary production occurring on earth and generated a carbon excursion. Another hypothesis dismisses the volcanogenic gas release and identifies the trigger as the end-Permian mantle plume. Suggesting that as it rose due to rifting and decompression melting, it heated sediments and methane hydrates under Siberia, which invoked the release of methane gas.

Both these alternative hypothesis however still support the idea tectonics could be an instigator in the Permian-Triassic mass extinction. The eruption of the Siberian traps gives evidence of the complex relationships between Earth’s spheres (in this case: atmosphere, hydrosphere and geosphere). In this case the geosphere (eruptions) warmed the atmosphere, this affected the hydrosphere and the biosphere by warming, increased acidic rain and ocean warming leading to anoxia. This then linked back to the atmosphere as the lack of photosynthesises meant lower amounts of carbon extracted from the atmosphere and further warming. It proves tectonic process’ may have bigger implications on life than we previously thought, because potentially in this case they have not created life but destroyed it.

The only question left on our minds now is, if without the tectonics rifting apart the West Siberian Basin, would there have ever been an event or a process that had the capability of producing enough greenhouse gases to promote the cascading collapse of entire ecosystems. Would the end-Permian mass extinction ever have occurred if tectonics didn’t instigate volcanic activity?

Josephine Turnbull

REFERENCES:
Ø  Chu, J. (2015). Siberian Traps likely culprit for end-Permian extinction. Retrieved from

Ø  Saunders, A., & Reichow.M. (2009). The Siberian Traps and the end-Permian Mass Extinction. Retrieved from

Ø  The Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica. (2014). Permian extinction. Retrieved from

Ø  Unknown. (n.d). The Permo-Triassic (P-T) Extinction. Retrieved from

Ø  Montenegro, A., Spence, P., Meissner, K. J., Eby, M., Melchin, M. J., & Johnston, S. T. (2011). Climate simulations of the permian-triassic boundary: Ocean acidification and the extinction event. Paleoceanography, 26(3) doi:10.1029/2010PA002058

Ø  Heydari, E., Arzani, N., & Hassanzadeh, J. (2008). Mantle plume: The invisible serial killer — application to the Permian–Triassic boundary mass extinction. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, 264(1), 147-162. doi:10.1016/j.palaeo.2008.04.013

Ø  Joachimski, M. M., Lai, X., Shen, S., Jiang, H., Luo, G., Chen, B.. . Sun, Y. (2012). Climate warming in the latest permian and the permian-triassic mass extinction. Geology, 40(3), 195-198. doi:10.1130/G32707.1

Ø  Schneebeli-Hermann, E., Kuerschner, W. M., Hochuli, P. A., Ware, D., Weissert, H., Bernasconi, S. M.. . Bucher, H. (2013). Evidence for atmospheric carbon injection during the end-permian extinction. Geology, 41(5), 579-582. doi:10.1130/G34047.1

Ø  Allen, M. B., Anderson, L., Searle, R. C., & Buslov, M. (2006). Oblique rift geometry of the west siberian basin: Tectonic setting for the siberian flood basalts. Journal of the Geological Society, 163(6), 901-904. doi:10.1144/0016-76492006-096



The Evolution of Whales

The Evolution of Whales

                                     Photo Source: http://scubadiverlife.com/tag/whale-shark-scuba-diving/

Whales are magnificent creatures of the sea; they are massive gentle beautiful and hold great intelligence. They started evolving over 50 million years ago and only have one living relative, which is the hippopotamus, however they are not ancestors. Early whales do not look or relatively compare to what we picture in our minds of a whale. Early whales such as the Balisosaurus and Pakicetus were typically land animals however had the ability to go into the water. They had a thick bony wall around the middle ear, which is incredibly similar to living whales yet so different to other mammals, and lived in a freshwater semi-aquatic environment. This meant that they could posses fur coats rather than a thick layer of blubber as, it was not yet needed to stay warm, as they weren’t spending majority of their time within water.

                                 Photo source: http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evograms_03

Around 50-55 million years ago, early Cenozoic era, India began it course to collide with Asia. This caused a great collision where the Tibetan plateau and the Himalayas were created. During this time climate wise, Earth had a relatively consistent climate no matter where you were situated (i.e. proximal to the equator). The most significant global warming period took place in this time period around 55.8 million years ago, it is known as the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. This is linked with a 5°C increase in temperature as well as changes within the carbon cycle, it saw an immense decrease in the 13C/12C ratio of marine and terrestrial carbonates as well as organic carbons. It also saw a large number of foraminifera to become extinct as well as sudden appearance of mammals on land within Europe and North America.

                                             
                         Photo source: http://www.scotese.com/newpage9.htm

Tectonically, Earth was very active during this time. There were many land bridges connecting many parts of the world together, such as Australia and Antarctica, North America and Europe through Greenland and potentially Asia and North America though the Bering Strait. These bridges were altered via tectonic movement. This rearrangement of boundaries saw changes within the dynamics of Earth. They way things functioned was altered and saw very significant alterations within the ocean and atmospheric circulation and temperature. The disconnection between Antarctica and Australia saw an incredibly large canyon between the now two continents, which created the circum-Antarctic Current. Change was seen in temperatures within the ocean due to the circulation patterns and global heat transport was altered. Currently it moves cooler water up from this canyon and circulates it around the different continents, resulting in a global cooling event as seen in towards the end of the Eocene. Increases in variability and seasonality, saw changes within mammals’ body size to increase to cope with the temperature changes throughout the year.

                                            Photo source: http://oxfordgeology.com/tag/pangea/

With the increase in temperature from the thermal maximum, land mammals such as Pakicetus and Balisosaurus (early whales) were forced to become more water orientated with the way they lived due to the selective pressure of increase in temperature. This increase saw theses mammals become more adaptive with water and learn to swim, hunt and live predominantly within the water, however still only semi-aquatic. Oceans became more temperate and species for marine animals started to diverse, with phytoplankton and zooplankton becoming a main food source of modern day whales and some earlier whales. With the change of becoming more marine orientated species, adaptation was necessary to live, limbs became shorter and bodies became more streamline, this is seen in Rodhocetus. The long hands and feet of Rodhocetus were probably webbed to enhance ability to swim efficiently. It also had a sacrum (a bone produced when vertebrae are fused together), which is positioned between the hipbones of the pelvis, causing to it to be immobile. The Rodhocetus also uses the power of its feet and uses the tail as a rudder, it spent majority of it’s time on the surface of the ocean, it was also had fur as insulation rather than blubber like modern day whales.
                                     Photo source: http://www.wunderground.com/climate/PETM.asp

Modern whales have come along way from living on land to living completely within the ocean. The Baleen Whales is the first whale that is still living within the ecosystem.With the circumpolar current being active, this ensured and increased the upwell of nutrient rich water full of phytoplankton and zooplankton, which is one of the main food sources for the Baleen whale. The Baleen whale is a toothless whales, therefore has a palate for phytoplankton and zooplankton, food that is small enough to be filtered from water. To be able to feed in this way, Baleen whales need an enlarged cavity that is adapted to suction feeding; this was evolved before specialisation for bulk filter feeding or raptorial feeding. In the evidence it came be seen that ancestral forms of mysticeti who had both regular and baleen teeth, which shows that this has been a change in the evolution of the genes due to the success of it.
                    Photo source: http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Baleen_whale


Whales have come along way in their evolution to get to where they are today. It can be assumed that tectonic processes paly a great role within the way they have developed from fur to blubber, paws to webbed feet and carnivorous teeth to filter feeders. It is hard to say that without the tectonic event that occurred (Australia rifting away from Antarctica) would have Balisosaurus and Pakicetus move from a fresh semi-aquatic environment to a salt habitat or the need to get away from the heat that was being generated from the Paleocene- Eocene Maximum. It is hard to imagine however, what would we have instead of whales? What mammal would have evolved to take the whales spot in the food chain? Would it be possible to go, as far to say that tectonics are the only reason we have these specific animals on Earth?

Rosie Hebden

References:

Gingerich, Philip D. 2003. "Land-to-Sea Transition in Early Whales: Evolution of Eocene Archaeoceti (Cetacea) in Relation to Skeletal Proportions and Locomotion of Living Semiaquatic Mammals." Paleobiology 29 (3):429-454. doi: 10.2307/4096936.

UCMP (University of California Museum of Paleontology). (2011). The Miocene Epoch.  Retrieved 27/09/2015 from http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/tertiary/eocene.php

PALEOMAP Project. (2003). The Cenozoic Era. Retrieved 28/09/2015 from http://www.scotese.com/newpage9.htm

Live Science. (2013) CEnozoic Era: Facts About Cliamte, Animals & Plants. Retrieved 29/09/2015 from http://www.livescience.com/40352-cenozoic-era.html


UCMP (University of California Museum of Paleontology). (2011). The Eocene Epoch.  Retrieved 30/09/2015 from http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/tertiary/eoc/eoctect.html