Regional Paleoecology of near-field marine faunas during the Late Paleozoic ice age, Western Argentina

DINEEN, A.A.; FRAISER, M.L.; TABOADA, A. C.; PAGANI, MARÍA ALEJANDRA; ISBELL, J.

Denver

Congreso; Annual Meeting of the Geological Society of America; 2010

Geological Society of America

The late Paleozoic Ice Age (LPIA) has long been known as an important climatic event in Earth’s history. The end of the LPIA is the only example in Earth’s history where a vegetated and biologically complex Earth transitioned from a bipolar icehouse to a greenhouse state. Recent studies show that LPIA climate changes broadly affected marine invertebrate faunas: glaciations decreased origination and extinction, and long-term, gradual global warming during the final deglaciation altered paleocommunity composition. Regional far-field studies demonstrate that LPIA shallow tropical paleocommunities were stable or weakly distinguishable, and comprised of similar sets of eurytopic taxa.