DINOSTRAT: a global database of the stratigraphic and paleolatitudinal distribution of Mesozoic–Cenozoic organic-walled dinoflagellate cysts

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Abstract

Abstract. Mesozoic–Cenozoic organic-walled dinoflagellate cyst (dinocyst) biostratigraphy is a crucial tool for relative and numerical age control in complex ancient sedimentary systems. However, stratigraphic ranges of dinocysts are found to be strongly diachronous geographically. A global compilation of state-of-the-art calibrated regional stratigraphic ranges could assist in quantifying regional differences and evaluating underlying causes. For this reason, DINOSTRAT is here introduced – an open-source, iterative, community-fed database intended to house all regional chronostratigraphic calibrations of dinocyst events (https://github.com/bijlpeter83/DINOSTRAT.git, last access: 1 February 2022) (DOI – https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5772616, Bijl, 2021). DINOSTRAT version 1.0 includes >8500 entries of the first and last occurrences (collectively called “events”) of >1900 dinocyst taxa and their absolute ties to the chronostratigraphic timescale of Gradstein et al. (2012). Entries are derived from 199 publications and 188 sedimentary sections. DINOSTRAT interpolates paleolatitudes of regional dinocyst events, allowing evaluation of the paleolatitudinal variability in dinocyst event ages. DINOSTRAT allows for open accessibility and searchability, based on region, age and taxon. This paper presents a selection of the data in DINOSTRAT: (1) the (paleo)latitudinal spread and evolutionary history of modern dinocyst species, (2) the evolutionary patterns and paleolatitudinal spread of dinocyst (sub)families, and (3) a selection of key dinocyst events which are particularly synchronous. Although several dinocysts show – at the resolution of their calibration – quasi-synchronous event ages, in fact many species have remarkable diachroneity. DINOSTRAT provides the data storage approach by which the community can now start to relate diachroneity to (1) inadequate ties to chronostratigraphic timescales, (2) complications in taxonomic concepts, and (3) ocean connectivity and/or the affinities of taxa to environmental conditions.

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An astronomically dated record of Earth’s climate and its predictability over the last 66 million years

Thomas Westerhold, Norbert Marwan, Anna Joy Drury … (2020)

Much of our understanding of Earth’s past climate comes from the measurement of oxygen and carbon isotope variations in deep-sea benthic foraminifera. Yet, long intervals in existing records lack the temporal resolution and age control needed to thoroughly categorize climate states of the Cenozoic era and to study their dynamics. Here, we present a new, highly resolved, astronomically dated, continuous composite of benthic foraminifer isotope records developed in our laboratories. Four climate states—Hothouse, Warmhouse, Coolhouse, Icehouse—are identified on the basis of their distinctive response to astronomical forcing depending on greenhouse gas concentrations and polar ice sheet volume. Statistical analysis of the nonlinear behavior encoded in our record reveals the key role that polar ice volume plays in the predictability of Cenozoic climate dynamics.

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Subtropical Arctic Ocean temperatures during the Palaeocene/Eocene thermal maximum

Appy Sluijs, Stefan Schouten, Mark Pagani … (2006)

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A Paleolatitude Calculator for Paleoclimate Studies

Douwe van Hinsbergen, Lennart de Groot, Sebastiaan van Schaik … (2015)

Realistic appraisal of paleoclimatic information obtained from a particular location requires accurate knowledge of its paleolatitude defined relative to the Earth’s spin-axis. This is crucial to, among others, correctly assess the amount of solar energy received at a location at the moment of sediment deposition. The paleolatitude of an arbitrary location can in principle be reconstructed from tectonic plate reconstructions that (1) restore the relative motions between plates based on (marine) magnetic anomalies, and (2) reconstruct all plates relative to the spin axis using a paleomagnetic reference frame based on a global apparent polar wander path. Whereas many studies do employ high-quality relative plate reconstructions, the necessity of using a paleomagnetic reference frame for climate studies rather than a mantle reference frame appears under-appreciated. In this paper, we briefly summarize the theory of plate tectonic reconstructions and their reference frames tailored towards applications of paleoclimate reconstruction, and show that using a mantle reference frame, which defines plate positions relative to the mantle, instead of a paleomagnetic reference frame may introduce errors in paleolatitude of more than 15° (>1500 km). This is because mantle reference frames cannot constrain, or are specifically corrected for the effects of true polar wander. We used the latest, state-of-the-art plate reconstructions to build a global plate circuit, and developed an online, user-friendly paleolatitude calculator for the last 200 million years by placing this plate circuit in three widely used global apparent polar wander paths. As a novelty, this calculator adds error bars to paleolatitude estimates that can be incorporated in climate modeling. The calculator is available at www.paleolatitude.org. We illustrate the use of the paleolatitude calculator by showing how an apparent wide spread in Eocene sea surface temperatures of southern high latitudes may be in part explained by a much wider paleolatitudinal distribution of sites than previously assumed.