Evidence for a prolonged Permian–Triassic extinction interval from global marine mercury records

Jun Shen (), Jiubin Chen, Thomas J. Algeo, Shengliu Yuan, Qinglai Feng, Jianxin Yu, Lian Zhou, Brennan O’Connell and Noah J. Planavsky
Additional contact information
Jun Shen: China University of Geosciences
Jiubin Chen: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Thomas J. Algeo: China University of Geosciences
Shengliu Yuan: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Qinglai Feng: China University of Geosciences
Jianxin Yu: China University of Geosciences
Lian Zhou: China University of Geosciences
Brennan O’Connell: Yale University
Noah J. Planavsky: Yale University

Nature Communications, 2019, vol. 10, issue 1, 1-9

Abstract: Abstract The latest Permian mass extinction, the most devastating biocrisis of the Phanerozoic, has been widely attributed to eruptions of the Siberian Traps Large Igneous Province, although evidence of a direct link has been scant to date. Here, we measure mercury (Hg), assumed to reflect shifts in volcanic activity, across the Permian-Triassic boundary in ten marine sections across the Northern Hemisphere. Hg concentration peaks close to the Permian-Triassic boundary suggest coupling of biotic extinction and increased volcanic activity. Additionally, Hg isotopic data for a subset of these sections provide evidence for largely atmospheric rather than terrestrial Hg sources, further linking Hg enrichment to increased volcanic activity. Hg peaks in shallow-water sections were nearly synchronous with the end-Permian extinction horizon, while those in deep-water sections occurred tens of thousands of years before the main extinction, possibly supporting a globally diachronous biotic turnover and protracted mass extinction event.

Date: 2019
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-09620-0 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:10:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-019-09620-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-019-09620-0

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().