Rapid recovery of life at ground zero of the end-Cretaceous mass extinction

• Published in: Nature
• Main Authors: Lowery, Christopher, Bralower, Timothy, Owens, Jeremy, Rodríguez-Tovar, Francisco, Jones, Heather, Smit, Jan, Whalen, Michael, Claeys, Phillipe, Farley, Kenneth, Gulick, Sean, Morgan, Joanna, Green, Sophie, Chenot, Elise, Christeson, Gail, Cockell, Charles, Coolen, Marco, Ferrière, Ludovic, Gebhardt, Catalina, Goto, Kazuhisa, Kring, David, LOFI, Johanna, Ocampo-Torres, Rubén, Perez-Cruz, Ligia, Pickersgill, Annemarie, Poelchau, Michael, Rae, Auriol, Rasmussen, Cornelia, Rebolledo-Vieyra, Mario, Riller, Ulrich, Sato, Honami, Tikoo, Sonia, Tomioka, Naotaka, Urrutia-Fucugauchi, Jaime, Vellekoop, Johan, Wittmann, Axel, Xiao, Long, Yamaguchi, Kosei, Zylberman, William
• Other Authors: Institute of Geophysics Austin (IG), University of Texas at Austin Austin, Department of Geosciences, Pennsylvania State University (Penn State), Penn State System-Penn State System, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences Amsterdam (FALW), Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Amsterdam (VU), University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF), Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences Pasadena, California Institute of Technology (CALTECH), Biogéosciences UMR 6282 Dijon (BGS), Université de Bourgogne (UB)-AgroSup Dijon - Institut National Supérieur des Sciences Agronomiques, de l'Alimentation et de l'Environnement-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Planetary and Space Sciences Research Institute Milton Keynes (PSSRI), Centre for Earth, Planetary, Space and Astronomical Research Milton Keynes (CEPSAR), The Open University Milton Keynes (OU)-The Open University Milton Keynes (OU), Natural History Museum Vienna (NHM), Alfred-Wegener-Institut, Helmholtz-Zentrum für Polar- und Meeresforschung (AWI), International Research Institute of Disaster Science, Tohoku University Sendai, Géosciences Montpellier, Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université de Montpellier (UM)-Université des Antilles (UA)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Institut de chimie et procédés pour l'énergie, l'environnement et la santé (ICPEES), Université de Strasbourg (UNISTRA)-Matériaux et nanosciences d'Alsace (FMNGE), Institut de Chimie du CNRS (INC)-Université de Strasbourg (UNISTRA)-Université de Haute-Alsace (UHA) Mulhouse - Colmar (Université de Haute-Alsace (UHA))-Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Institut de Chimie du CNRS (INC)-Université de Strasbourg (UNISTRA)-Université de Haute-Alsace (UHA) Mulhouse - Colmar (Université de Haute-Alsace (UHA))-Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Instituto de Geofísica, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), School of Geographical and Earth Sciences, University of Glasgow, Geology, University of Freiburg Freiburg, Department of Earth Science and Technology Imperial College London, Imperial College London, Department of Geology and Geophysics, University of Utah, Unidad de Ciencias del Agua, Centro de Investigación Científica de Yucatán, Institut für Geologie, Universität Hamburg (UHH), Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC), Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences Piscataway, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey New Brunswick (RU), Rutgers University System (Rutgers)-Rutgers University System (Rutgers), Kochi Institute for Core Sample Research, Physical Sciences, Arizona State University Tempe (ASU)-LeRoy Eyring Center for Solid State Science, Centre for Planetary Science and Exploration London, ON (CPSX), University of Western Ontario (UWO)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2018
• Subjects: [SDU]Sciences of the Universe [physics]; [SDU.STU.PG]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Paleontology; North Atlantic
• Online Access: https://hal.umontpellier.fr/hal-01849424; https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-018-0163-6

International audience The Cretaceous/Palaeogene mass extinction eradicated 76% of species on Earth. It was caused by the impact of an asteroid on the Yucatán carbonate platform in the southern Gulf of Mexico 66 million years ago, forming the Chicxulub impact crater. After the mass extinction, the recovery of the global marine ecosystem—measured as primary productivity—was geographically heterogeneous; export production in the Gulf of Mexico and North Atlantic–western Tethys was slower than in most other regions, taking 300 thousand years (kyr) to return to levels similar to those of the Late Cretaceous period. Delayed recovery of marine productivity closer to the crater implies an impact-related environmental control, such as toxic metal poisoning, on recovery times. If no such geographic pattern exists, the best explanation for the observed heterogeneity is a combination of ecological factors—trophic interactions, species incumbency and competitive exclusion by opportunists—and ‘chance’. The question of whether the post-impact recovery of marine productivity was delayed closer to the crater has a bearing on the predictability of future patterns of recovery in anthropogenically perturbed ecosystems. If there is a relationship between the distance from the impact and the recovery of marine productivity, we would expect recovery rates to be slowest in the crater itself. Here we present a record of foraminifera, calcareous nannoplankton, trace fossils and elemental abundance data from within the Chicxulub crater, dated to approximately the first 200 kyr of the Palaeocene. We show that life reappeared in the basin just years after the impact and a high-productivity ecosystem was established within 30 kyr, which indicates that proximity to the impact did not delay recovery and that there was therefore no impact-related environmental control on recovery. Ecological processes probably controlled the recovery of productivity after the Cretaceous/Palaeogene mass extinction and are therefore likely to be important for ...