Impact of mid Eocene greenhouse warming on America’s southernmost floras
Abstract A major climate shift took place about 40 Myr ago—the Middle Eocene Climatic Optimum or MECO—triggered by a significant rise of atmospheric CO 2 concentrations. The biotic response to this MECO is well documented in the marine realm, but poorly explored in adjacent landmasses. Here, we quan...
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crspringernat:10.1038/s42003-021-01701-5 2023-05-15T14:11:10+02:00 Impact of mid Eocene greenhouse warming on America’s southernmost floras Fernández, Damián A. Palazzesi, Luis González Estebenet, M. Sol Tellería, M. Cristina Barreda, Viviana D. 2021 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s42003-021-01701-5 http://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-021-01701-5.pdf http://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-021-01701-5 en eng Springer Science and Business Media LLC https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 CC-BY Communications Biology volume 4, issue 1 ISSN 2399-3642 General Agricultural and Biological Sciences General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology Medicine (miscellaneous) journal-article 2021 crspringernat https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-021-01701-5 2022-01-04T08:41:08Z Abstract A major climate shift took place about 40 Myr ago—the Middle Eocene Climatic Optimum or MECO—triggered by a significant rise of atmospheric CO 2 concentrations. The biotic response to this MECO is well documented in the marine realm, but poorly explored in adjacent landmasses. Here, we quantify the response of the floras from America’s southernmost latitudes based on the analysis of terrestrially derived spores and pollen grains from the mid-late Eocene (~46–34 Myr) of southern Patagonia. Robust nonparametric estimators indicate that floras in southern Patagonia were in average ~40% more diverse during the MECO than pre-MECO and post-MECO intervals. The high atmospheric CO 2 and increasing temperatures may have favored the combination of neotropical migrants with Gondwanan species, explaining in part the high diversity that we observed during the MECO. Our reconstructed biota reflects a greenhouse world and offers a climatic and ecological deep time scenario of an ice-free sub-Antarctic realm. Article in Journal/Newspaper Antarc* Antarctic Springer Nature (via Crossref) Antarctic Patagonia Communications Biology 4 1 |
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Open Polar |
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Springer Nature (via Crossref) |
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crspringernat |
language |
English |
topic |
General Agricultural and Biological Sciences General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology Medicine (miscellaneous) |
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General Agricultural and Biological Sciences General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology Medicine (miscellaneous) Fernández, Damián A. Palazzesi, Luis González Estebenet, M. Sol Tellería, M. Cristina Barreda, Viviana D. Impact of mid Eocene greenhouse warming on America’s southernmost floras |
topic_facet |
General Agricultural and Biological Sciences General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology Medicine (miscellaneous) |
description |
Abstract A major climate shift took place about 40 Myr ago—the Middle Eocene Climatic Optimum or MECO—triggered by a significant rise of atmospheric CO 2 concentrations. The biotic response to this MECO is well documented in the marine realm, but poorly explored in adjacent landmasses. Here, we quantify the response of the floras from America’s southernmost latitudes based on the analysis of terrestrially derived spores and pollen grains from the mid-late Eocene (~46–34 Myr) of southern Patagonia. Robust nonparametric estimators indicate that floras in southern Patagonia were in average ~40% more diverse during the MECO than pre-MECO and post-MECO intervals. The high atmospheric CO 2 and increasing temperatures may have favored the combination of neotropical migrants with Gondwanan species, explaining in part the high diversity that we observed during the MECO. Our reconstructed biota reflects a greenhouse world and offers a climatic and ecological deep time scenario of an ice-free sub-Antarctic realm. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Fernández, Damián A. Palazzesi, Luis González Estebenet, M. Sol Tellería, M. Cristina Barreda, Viviana D. |
author_facet |
Fernández, Damián A. Palazzesi, Luis González Estebenet, M. Sol Tellería, M. Cristina Barreda, Viviana D. |
author_sort |
Fernández, Damián A. |
title |
Impact of mid Eocene greenhouse warming on America’s southernmost floras |
title_short |
Impact of mid Eocene greenhouse warming on America’s southernmost floras |
title_full |
Impact of mid Eocene greenhouse warming on America’s southernmost floras |
title_fullStr |
Impact of mid Eocene greenhouse warming on America’s southernmost floras |
title_full_unstemmed |
Impact of mid Eocene greenhouse warming on America’s southernmost floras |
title_sort |
impact of mid eocene greenhouse warming on america’s southernmost floras |
publisher |
Springer Science and Business Media LLC |
publishDate |
2021 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s42003-021-01701-5 http://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-021-01701-5.pdf http://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-021-01701-5 |
geographic |
Antarctic Patagonia |
geographic_facet |
Antarctic Patagonia |
genre |
Antarc* Antarctic |
genre_facet |
Antarc* Antarctic |
op_source |
Communications Biology volume 4, issue 1 ISSN 2399-3642 |
op_rights |
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-021-01701-5 |
container_title |
Communications Biology |
container_volume |
4 |
container_issue |
1 |
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1766283290771193856 |