Bits of Paleo Studies

When the ice goes, so does the rainforest – boreal warming linked to Amazon droughts

We knew there must have been a connection between climate warming and damaging droughts in the world’s largest rainforest, as the two globally hottest years on record (2005 and 2010) coincide with the two record droughts in the Amazon – … Continue reading →

Mercury: a new culprit in end-Permian mass extinction event

Volcanic eruptions have already been appointed as the main culprit of the Permian-Triassic mass extinction. Previous research indicated that the resulting rise in atmospheric and oceanic carbon lead to the Great dying. But new findings in the journal Geology point to a … Continue reading →

Droughts in Horn of Africa have been common for last 20,000 years

This year’s catastrophic drought in Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Somalia is thought to be an indirect consequence of the 2010-2011 La Niña. As part of ENSO cycles such droughts come and go – and have been typical for the region … Continue reading →

Drop in CO2 heralded the onset of Antarctic glaciation

For about 100 million years all sorts of animals roamed the then subtropical North and South poles. But then suddenly some 34 million years ago during the Eocene everything changed when temperatures fell dramatically in only a 100,000 year timespan, … Continue reading →

Marine biodiversity driven by environmental changes

Our most important source for knowledge about past life is the fossil record. But how exact is it in telling us about the history of life? According to a new study in Science the evolution of marine life over the … Continue reading →

Good news? According to paleo research median CO2 climate sensitivity could be 0.7 degrees lower

The most-quoted climate sensitivity range (IPCC 4AR) suggests a median temperature response to a doubling of the atmospheric CO2 concentration of 3 degrees Celsius – and a 66 percent probability range warming under CO2-doubling will be somewhere between 1.5 and … Continue reading →