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First Plants Caused Ice Ages

By Guest PostFebruary 1, 2012Environment, Natureatmospheric carbon, atmospheric carbon level, calcium, carbon cycle, carbonate rocks, chemical weathering, climate, earth surface, first land plants, global cooling, granite, ice ages, iron, liam dolan, magnesium, marine life, mass extinction, mineral, modern moss, ocean, ordovician period, oxford university, phosphorus, physcomitrella patens, reduction, rocks, silicate rocks, tim lenton, university of exeter

*New research reveals how the arrival of the first plants 470 million years ago triggered a series of ice ages. Led by the Universities of Exeter and Oxford, the study is published in Nature Geoscience.*

The team set out to identify the effects that the first land plants had on the climate during the Ordovician Period, which ended 444 million years ago. During this period the climate gradually cooled, leading to a series of ‘ice ages’. This global cooling was caused by a dramatic reduction in atmospheric carbon, which this research now suggests was triggered by the arrival of plants.

Among the first plants to grow on land were the ancestors of mosses that grow today. This study shows that they extracted minerals such as calcium, magnesium, phosphorus and iron from rocks in order to grow. In so doing, they caused chemical weathering of the Earth’s surface. This had a dramatic impact on the global carbon cycle and subsequently on the climate. It could also have led to a mass extinction of marine life. (more…)

‘Ancient Hominid Males Stayed Home While Females Roamed’

By Guest PostJune 7, 2011Scienceantelope, australopithecus africanus, baboons, basalt, bipedal hominid species, bipedalism, darryl de ruiter, early hominids, ethiopian fossil, female teeth, fossilized teeth, gadabout gals, geological substrates, Germany, granite, high tech analysis, hominid family tree, hyraxes, julia lee thorp, laser ablation, leipzig, local geology, lucy, male hominid teeth, mammal teeth, matt sponheimer, max plank institute for evolutionary anthropology, paranthropus boisei, paranthropus robustus, quartzite, sandi copeland, sandstone, South Africa, south african savannah, sterkfontein and swartkans cave systems, strontium isotope, strontium isotope signatures, university of colorado boulder

The males of two bipedal hominid species that roamed the South African savannah more than a million years ago were stay-at-home kind of guys when compared to the gadabout gals, says a new high-tech study led by the University of Colorado Boulder.

The team, which studied teeth from a group of extinct Australopithecus africanus and Paranthropus robustus individuals from two adjacent cave systems in South Africa, found more than half of the female teeth were from outside the local area, said CU-Boulder adjunct professor and lead study author Sandi Copeland. In contrast, only about 10 percent of the male hominid teeth were from elsewhere, suggesting they likely grew up and died in the same area. (more…)

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First Plants Caused Ice Ages

‘Ancient Hominid Males Stayed Home While Females Roamed’