Evidence for a Solar Flare Cause of the Pleistocene Mass Extinction

• Main Author: LaViolette, Paul A
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Radiocarbon 2011
• Subjects: Greenland
• Online Access: https://journals.uair.arizona.edu/index.php/radiocarbon/article/view/3464

The hypothesis is presented that an abrupt rise in atmospheric radiocarbon concentration evident in the Cariaco Basin varve record at 12,837 10 cal yr BP, contemporaneous with the Rancholabrean termination, may have been produced by a super-sized solar proton event (SPE) having a fluence of ~1.3 x 1011 protons/cm2. A SPE of this magnitude would have been large enough to deliver a lethal radiation dose of at least 3-6 Sv to the Earth?s surface, and hence could have been a principal cause of the final termination of the Pleistocene megafauna and several genera of smaller mammals and birds. The event time-correlates with a large-magnitude acidity spike found at 1708.65 m in the GISP2 Greenland ice record, which is associated with high NO-3 ion concentrations and a rapid rise in 10Be deposition rate, all of which are indicators of a sudden cosmic-ray influx. The depletion of nitrate ions within this acidic ice layer suggests that the snowpack surface at that time was exposed to intense UV for a prolonged period, which is consistent with a temporary destruction of the polar ozone layer by solar cosmic rays. The acidity event also coincides with a large-magnitude, abrupt climatic excursion and is associated with elevated ammonium ion concentrations, an indicator of global fires.