No state change in pelagic fish production and biodiversity during the Eocene-Oligocene Transition ...

• Main Authors: Sibert, Elizabeth, Zill, Michelle, Frigyik, Ella, Norris, Richard
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: Dryad 2019
• Subjects: Eocene-Oligocene; Microfossils; Ichthyoliths; pelagic fish; Pacific; Southern Ocean; Antarc*; Antarctica
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.nk98sf7q5; https://datadryad.org/stash/dataset/doi:10.5061/dryad.nk98sf7q5

The Eocene-Oligocene (E/O) boundary ~33.9 million years ago, has been described as a state change in the Earth system marked by the permanent glaciation of Antarctica and a proposed increase in oceanic productivity. Here we quantified the response of fish production and biodiversity to this event using microfossil fish teeth (ichthyoliths) in seven deep-sea sediment cores from around the world. Ichthyolith accumulation rate (a proxy for fish biomass production) shows no synchronous trends across the E/O. Ichthyolith accumulation in the Southern Ocean and Pacific Gyre sites is an order of magnitude lower than the equatorial and Atlantic sites, demonstrating that the Southern Ocean was not a highly productive ecosystem for fish before or after the E/O. Further, tooth morphotype diversity and assemblage composition remained stable across the interval, indicating little change in the biodiversity or ecological role of open ocean fish. While the E/O boundary was a major global climate change event, its impact on ... : README for Data Archive for: Pelagic fish production and diversity unchanging across the Eocene-Oligocene Glaciation Elizabeth C Sibert, Michelle E Zill, Ella T. Frigyik, and Richard D Norris Contact: Elizabeth Sibert ([e-mail]) *Email address will be updated at a future time This dataset consists of images of each unique ocean drilling sample considered in this study. There are two sites included in this study: DSDP Site 596 and ODP Site 689. They were imaged at different times and on different instruments, however the data are functionally equivilant. File Name information: ODP Site 689: Filenames take the form: SiteNumber_SlideNumber_SampleNumber_IODP-Core_IODP-Section_IODP-SampleDepthInterval_HoleNumber_ZoomLevel ODP-689B ANT01 001 10H 1W 10-13cm N1of2 z200x Imaged on a Keyence Digital Microscope System at Harvard University, using the Museum of Comparative Zoology's Digital Imaging Facilities Tooth IDs are in Table S20 from supplemental Dataset Excel spreadsheet DSDP Site 596: Filenames ...