Abiotic Forcing of Plankton Evolution in the Cenozoic

We characterize the evolutionary radiation of planktic foraminifera by the test size distributions of entire assemblages in more than 500 Cenozoic marine sediment samples, including more than 1 million tests. Calibration of Holocene size patterns with environmental parameters and comparisons with Ce...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science) 2004-01, Vol.303 (5655), p.207-210
Main Authors: Schmidt, Daniela N., Thierstein, Hans R., Bollmann, Jörg, Schiebel, Ralf
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animals
Biological Evolution
Cenozoic
Climate
Climate change
Cooling
Correlation
Correlations
Earth sciences
Earth, ocean, space
Ecosystem
Environmental aspects
Environmental Influences
Eukaryota - chemistry
Eukaryota - cytology
Evolution
Exact sciences and technology
Extinct species
Foraminifera
Fractions
Genetic aspects
Geography
Geological time
Geology
History
Holocene Epoch
Invertebrate paleontology
Isotopes
Marine
Measurement Techniques
Organic Chemistry
Oxygen isotopes
Oxygen Isotopes - analysis
Paleobiology
Paleontology
Plankton
Plankton - chemistry
Plankton - cytology
Seawater
Species
Temperature
Temperature gradients
Time
Water
Zooplankton - chemistry
Zooplankton - cytology
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Summary:We characterize the evolutionary radiation of planktic foraminifera by the test size distributions of entire assemblages in more than 500 Cenozoic marine sediment samples, including more than 1 million tests. Calibration of Holocene size patterns with environmental parameters and comparisons with Cenozoic paleoproxy data show a consistently positive correlation between test size and surface-water stratification intensity. We infer that the observed macroevolutionary increase in test size of planktic foraminifera through the Cenozoic was an adaptive response to intensifying surface-water stratification in low latitudes, which was driven by polar cooling.
ISSN:0036-8075
1095-9203
DOI:10.1126/science.1090592