Flood basalts and extinction events

Biology

Scientific paper

Rate now

  [ 0.00 ] – not rated yet Voters 0   Comments 0

Details

21

Basalt, Magma, Mesozoic Era, Paleobiology, Cross Correlation, Error Analysis

Scientific paper

The largest known effusive eruptions during the Cenozoic and Mesozoic Eras, the voluminous flood basalts, have long been suspected as being associated with major extinctions of biotic species. Despite the possible errors attached to the dates in both time series of events, the significance level of the suspected correlation is found here to be 1 percent to 4 percent. Statistically, extinctions lag eruptions by a mean time interval that is indistinguishable from zero, being much less than the average residual derived from the correlation analysis. Oceanic flood basalts, however, must have had a different biological impact, which is still uncertain owing to the small number of known examples and differing physical factors. Although not all continental flood basalts can have produced major extinction events, the noncorrelating eruptions may have led to smaller marine extinction events that terminated at least some of the less catastrophically ending geologic stages. Consequently, the 26 Myr quasi-periodicity seen in major marine extinctions may be only a sampling effect, rather than a manifestation of underlying periodicity.

No associations

LandOfFree

Say what you really think

Search LandOfFree.com for scientists and scientific papers. Rate them and share your experience with other people.

Rating

Flood basalts and extinction events does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Flood basalts and extinction events, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Flood basalts and extinction events will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

     

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-1070900

  Search
All data on this website is collected from public sources. Our data reflects the most accurate information available at the time of publication.