(NLDO) - Limestone from an Italian town has revealed a Jurassic mass extinction event and what scientists call a "warning from the deep"
A research team led by Duke University (USA) has discovered an important clue in limestone on the outskirts of the town of Mercato San Severino - Italy, shedding light on the mass extinction of marine life in the middle of the Jurassic period.
"This event and others like it are the best examples we have of what will happen to Earth in the coming decades and centuries," said Michael A. Kipp, lead author of the study, in a statement to SciTech Daily .
Italian limestone collected from the Mercato San Severino area in southern Italy contains molecular traces of ancient ocean chemistry - Photo: Mariano Remírez/GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY
During the Jurassic period, when marine reptiles such as ichthyosaurs and plesiosaurs thrived, volcanic activity in what is now South Africa released about 20,500 billion tons of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) over 500,000 years.
These massive emissions have heated the oceans, depriving them of oxygen.
Studying limestone sediments carrying chemicals dating back to the time of the volcanic eruption, researchers show that at one point, oxygen was completely depleted in 8% of the ancient global seafloor, an area three times the size of the United States today.
This caused marine life to suffocate and become extinct en masse 183 million years ago.
There is one scary thing: The "death" of the past is returning, because of humans.
Since the Industrial Revolution began in the 18th and 19th centuries, human activities have emitted CO 2 equivalent to 12% of the emissions during the Jurassic volcanic period.
But Associate Professor Kipp said the current rapid release of CO2 into the atmosphere was unprecedented in history, making it difficult to predict when another mass extinction would occur or how severe it would be.
However, human activity is more than capable of causing a catastrophic event similar to the Jurassic period. It is clear that human greenhouse gas emissions are depleting some areas of the ocean of oxygen.
This “warning from the deep” threatens not only marine life, but also every living thing on the planet, including humans. Because a mass extinction that causes such an ecological imbalance always has global implications.
The new study was just published in the scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Source: https://nld.com.vn/thu-lam-sinh-vat-ky-jura-tuyet-chung-dang-hoi-sinh-196240706083021792.htm
Comment (0)