Benthic marine palaeoecology and recovery from the end-Triassic mass extinction in the Hettangian and Sinemurian (Early Jurassic) of southern Germany (2025)

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Recovery of benthic marine communities from the end-Permian mass extinction at the low latitudes of eastern Panthalassa

Richard Hofmann, Vennin Emmanuelle, Jim Jenks, Kevin Bylund, Arnaud Brayard

Palaeontology

Based on the quantitative community analysis using species-level identifications, we track the restoration of benthic ecosystems after the end-Permian mass extinction throughout the Lower Triassic of the western USA. New data on the palaeoecology of the Thaynes Group and Sinbad Formation are provided, which fill a gap between the recently studied palaeoecology of the Griesbachian–Dienerian Dinwoody Formation and the Spathian Virgin Formation. In the Sinbad Formation and Thaynes Group, 17 species (12 genera) of bivalves, 7 species and genera of gastropods and 2 species and genera of brachiopods are recognized. The new bivalve genus Confusionella (Pteriidae) is described. A comprehensive review of the whole Lower Triassic succession of benthic ecosystems of the western USA indicates that mid- and inner shelf environments show incipient recovery signals around the Griesbachian–Dienerian transition, during the Smithian and, most profound, during the early Spathian. Ecological data from youngest strata of the Dinwoody Formation as well as stratigraphic ranges of species suggest that the late Dienerian was likely a time interval of environmental stress for benthic ecosystems. Despite some evidence for short-term environmental disturbances (e.g. shift of dominant taxa, transient drop in alpha-diversity) during the Smithian–Spathian transition, benthic ecosystems did not show any notable taxonomic turnover at that time, in contrast to the major crisis that affected ammonoids and conodonts. Whereas alpha-diversity of benthic communities generally increased throughout the Early Triassic, beta-diversity remained low, which reflects a persistently wide environmental range of benthic species. This observation is in accordance with a recently proposed model that predicts a time lag between increasing within-habitat diversity (alpha-diversity) and the onset of taxonomic differentiation between habitats (beta-diversity) during biotic recoveries from mass extinction events. The observation that beta-diversity had not significantly increased during the Early Triassic might also provide an explanation for the comparably sluggish increase in benthic diversity during that time, which has previously been attributed to persistent environmental stress.

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Recovery and diversification of marine communities following the late Permian mass extinction event in the western Palaeotethys

Krisztina Sebe

Global and Planetary Change, 2017

The recovery of benthic invertebrates following the late Permian mass extinction event is often described as occurring in the Middle Triassic associated with the return of Early Triassic Lazarus taxa, increased body sizes, platform margin metazoan reefs, and increased tiering. Most quantitative palaeoecological studies, however, are limited to the Early Triassic and the timing of the final phase of recovery is rarely quantified. Here, quantitative abundance data of benthic invertebrates were collected from the Middle Triassic (Anisian) succession of the Mecsek Mountains (Hungary), and analysed with univariate and multivariate statistics to investigate the timing of recovery following the late Permian mass extinction. These communities lived in a mixed siliciclastic-carbonate ramp setting on the western margin of the Palaeotethys Ocean. The new data presented here is combined with the previously studied Lower Triassic succession of the Aggtelek Karst (Hungary), which records deposition of comparable facies and in the same region of the Palaeotethys Ocean. The Middle Triassic benthic fauna can be characterised by three distinct ecological states. The first state is recorded in the Viganvár Limestone Formation representing mollusc-dominated communities restricted to above wave base,

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Peer Review #3 of "The main stage of recovery after the end-Permian mass extinction: taxonomic rediversification and ecologic reorganization of marine level-bottom communities during the Middle Triassic (v0.1)

Alexander Nützel

PeerJ, 2021

The recovery of marine life from the end-Permian mass extinction event provides a testcase for biodiversification models in general, but few studies have addressed this episode in its full length and ecological context. This study analyses the recovery of marine levelbottom communities from the end-Permian mass extinction event over a period of 15 Ma, with a main focus on the previously neglected main phase during the Middle Triassic. Our analyses are based on faunas from 37 lithological units representing different environmental settings, ranging from lagoons to inner, mid-and outer ramps. Our dataset comprises 1562 species, which belong to 13 higher taxa and 12 ecological guilds. The diversification pattern of most taxa and guilds shows an initial Early Triassic lag phase that is followed by a hyperbolic diversity increase during the Bithynian (early middle Anisian) and became damped later in the Middle Triassic. The hyperbolic diversity increase is not predicted by models that suggest environmental causes for the initial lag phase. We therefore advocate a model in which diversification is primarily driven by the intensity of biotic interactions. Accordingly, the Early Triassic lag phase represents the time when the reduced species richness in the wake of the end-Permian mass extinction was insufficient for stimulating major diversifications, whereas the Anisian main diversification event started when self-accelerating processes became effective and stopped when nichecrowding prevented further diversification. Biotic interactions that might drive this pattern include interspecific competition but also habitat construction, ecosystem engineering and new options for trophic relationships. The latter factors are discussed in the context of the resurgence of large carbonate platforms, which occurred simultaneously with the diversification of benthic communities. These did not only provide new hardground habitats for a variety of epifaunal taxa, but also new options for grazing gastropods that supposedly fed from microalgae growing on dasycladaceans and other macroalgae. Whereas we do not claim that changing environmental conditions were generally

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Ecological, taxonomic, and taphonomic components of the post-Paleozoic increase in sample-level species diversity of marine benthos

Wolfgang Kiessling, Susan Barbour, Franz Fürsich, Daniele Scarponi

2006

Abstract Biological veracity of the sharp diversity increase observed in many analyses of the post-Paleozoic marine fossil record has been debated vigorously in recent years. To assess this question for sample-level (“alpha”) diversity, we used bulk samples of shelly invertebrates, representing three major fossil groups (brachiopods, bivalves, and gastropods), to compare the Jurassic and late Cenozoic sample-level diversity of marine benthos.

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Restructuring in benthic level-bottom shallow marine communities due to prolonged environmental stress following the end-Permian mass extinction

Margaret Fraiser

Comptes Rendus Palevol, 2005

Because the end-Permian mass extinction was the largest mass extinction since the Cambrian, numerous studies have focused on taxonomic changes and patterns immediately before and after the Permian/Triassic boundary. This synthesis of paleoecological data demonstrates that the end-Permian mass extinction and the Early Triassic aftermath were ecologically, as well as taxonomically, significant events in the history of life. A variety of short-term and long-term structural changes in ecosystems and paleocommunities were facilitated by deleterious environmental conditions that persisted through the Early Triassic. To cite this article: M.L. Fraiser, D.J. Bottjer, C. R. Palevol 4 (2005).

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Extinction trajectories of benthic organisms across the Triassic-Jurassic boundary

Peter Wagner

2007

We analysed diversity and abundance patterns of benthic organisms across the Triassic–Jurassic (TJ) boundary based on the Paleobiology Database (PBDB), which compiles palaeontological collection data on a global scale. While Sepkoski's [Sepkoski, JJ Jr., 2002. A compendium of fossil marine animal genera.

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Alfréd Dulai

Owing to the assumed lack of deep-sea macrofossils older than the Late Cretaceous, very little is known about the geological history of deep-sea communities, and most inference-based hypotheses argue for repeated recolonizations of the deep sea from shelf habitats following major palaeoceanographic perturbations. We present a fossil deep-sea assemblage of echinoderms, gastropods, brachiopods and ostracods, from the Early Jurassic of the Glasenbach Gorge, Austria, which includes the oldest known representatives of a number of extant deep-sea groups, and thus implies that in situ diversification, in contrast to immigration from shelf habitats, played a much greater role in shaping modern deep-sea biodiversity than previously thought. A comparison with coeval shelf assemblages reveals that, at least in some of the analysed groups, significantly more extant families/superfamilies have endured in the deep sea since the Early Jurassic than in the shelf seas, which suggests that deepsea biota are more resilient against extinction than shallow-water ones. In addition, a number of extant deep-sea families/superfamilies found in the Glasenbach assemblage lack post-Jurassic shelf occurrences, implying that if there was a complete extinction of the deep-sea fauna followed by replacement from the shelf, it must have happened before the Late Jurassic.

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First glimpse into Lower Jurassic deep-sea biodiversity: in situ diversification and resilience against extinction

Steffen Kiel, Alan Lord, Sabine Stöhr, Andreas Kroh, Alfréd Dulai

Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 2014

Owing to the assumed lack of deep-sea macrofossils older than the Late Cretaceous, very little is known about the geological history of deep-sea communities, and most inference-based hypotheses argue for repeated recolonizations of the deep sea from shelf habitats following major palaeoceanographic perturbations. We present a fossil deep-sea assemblage of echinoderms, gastropods, brachiopods and ostracods, from the Early Jurassic of the Glasenbach Gorge, Austria, which includes the oldest known representatives of a number of extant deep-sea groups, and thus implies that in situ diversification, in contrast to immigration from shelf habitats, played a much greater role in shaping modern deep-sea biodiversity than previously thought. A comparison with coeval shelf assemblages reveals that, at least in some of the analysed groups, significantly more extant families/superfamilies have endured in the deep sea since the Early Jurassic than in the shelf seas, which suggests that deepsea biota are more resilient against extinction than shallow-water ones. In addition, a number of extant deep-sea families/superfamilies found in the Glasenbach assemblage lack post-Jurassic shelf occurrences, implying that if there was a complete extinction of the deep-sea fauna followed by replacement from the shelf, it must have happened before the Late Jurassic.

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Geographical distribution and extinction risk: lessons from Triassic?Jurassic marine benthic organisms

Martin Aberhan, Wolfgang Kiessling

Journal of Biogeography, 2007

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New data from Oman indicate benthic high biomass productivity coupled with low taxonomic diversity in the aftermath of the Permian–Triassic Boundary mass extinction

Alexander Nützel

Lethaia, 2018

A new Early Triassic marine fauna is described from an exotic block (olistolith) from the Ad Daffah conglomerate in eastern Oman (Batain), which provides new insights into the ecology and diversity during the early aftermath of the Permian-Triassic Boundary mass extinction. Based on conodont quantitative biochronology, we assign a middle Griesbachian age to the upper part of this boulder. It was derived from an offshore seamount and yielded both nektonic and benthic faunas, including conodonts, ammonoids, gastropods and crinoid ossicles in mass abundance. This demonstrates that despite the stratigraphically near extinction at the Permian-Triassic Boundary, Crinoidea produced enough biomass to form crinoidal limestone as early as middle Griesbachian time. Baudicrinus, previously placed in Dadocrinidae, is now placed in Holocrinidae; therefore, Dadocrinidae are absent in the Early Triassic, and Holocrinidae remains the most basal crown-group articulates, originating during the middle Griesbachian in the Tethyan Realm. Abundant gastropods assigned to Naticopsis reached a shell size larger than 20 mm and provide another example against any generalized Lilliput effect during the Griesbachian. Whereas the benthic biomass was as high as to allow the resumption of small carbonate factories, the taxonomic diversity of the benthos remained low compared to post-Early Triassic times. This slow benthic taxonomic recovery is here attributed to low competition within impoverished post-extinction faunas. □ benthos, biotic recovery, Griesbachian, Oman, Permian-Triassic Boundary.

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Benthic marine palaeoecology and recovery from the end-Triassic mass extinction in the Hettangian and Sinemurian (Early Jurassic) of southern Germany (2025)

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