The Global Triassic

This volume presents the latest science on all significant geological and paleontological aspects of the Earth during the Late Triassic Period. Rather than presenting a collection of narrowly focused research papers, the volume consists of a series of peer-reviewed chapters on specific aspects of the Late Triassic world (e.g., tectonics, magmatism, paleobotany, climate, etc.), all authored by experts in the subject of their respective chapters. Each chapter reviews and summarizes the latest findings in these fields and also includes a review of the pertinent literature. The author list is very broadly international and forms a veritable who’s who of expertise in these fields. The book is loosely organized to present the physical aspects of Earth during the Late Triassic at the outset, followed by the paleontological aspects. The latter section is further organized to present the record of the marine environment first before moving onto land, with fauna followed by flora. The volume closes with a review of the end-Triassic extinctions.

The Mesozoic Era begins with the approximately 50-million-year-long Triassic Period, a major juncture in Earth history when the vast Pangaean supercontinent completed its assembly and began its fragmentation, and the global biota diversified and modern-ized after the end-Permian mass extinction, the most extensive biotic decimation of the Phanerozoic. The temporal ordering of geological and biotic events during Triassic time thus is critical to the interpretation of some unique and pivotal events in Earth his-tory. This temporal ordering is mostly based on the Triassic time-scale, which has been developed and refined for nearly two centu-ries. This book reviews the state of the art of the Triassic timescale and includes comprehensive analyses of Triassic radio-isotopic ages, magnetostratigraphy, isotope-based and cyclostratigraphic correlations and timescale -relevant marine and non-marine bio-stratigraphy.

The Triassic period is generally viewed as the beginning of the Age of Dinosaurs. For paleontologists, however, it also marks the rise of the world's first modern land ecosystems. Over the past three decades, extensive, worldwide fieldwork has led to the discovery of many new species of Triassic animals and plants, suggesting that faunal and floral changes already began in the Middle Triassic and were more protracted than previously thought. The Late Triassic is a pivotal time in the evolution of life on land, with many of the major groups of present-day vertebrates and insects first appearing in the fossil record. This book provides the first detailed overview of life on land during the Triassic period for advanced students and researchers. Noted vertebrate paleontologists Hans-Dieter Sues and Nicholas C. Fraser also review the biotic changes of this period and their possible causes.

Takes the reader back 210 million years to the age when dinosaurs first evolved and describes the world of that time.

The extinction that wiped out 95% of the living species at the end of the Paleozoic era can be explained by the fact that when it happened, all landmasses were one continent, Pangea, with an inner ocean, the Paleo-Tethys. This ocean included the richest n

*Includes pictures *Includes a bibliography for further reading Scientists have long attempted to understand Earth's past, and in service to that effort, they have divided the world's history into eons, eras, periods, epochs and ages. For example, the current eon is called the Phanerozoic, which means "visible life." This is the eon in which multi-cellular life has evolved and thrived. Before this, life was microscopic (single cell).The Phanerozoic eon is divided into 3 eras - Paleozoic ("old life"), Mesozoic ("middle life") and Cenozoic ("new life"). From there, the Mesozoic era is divided into 3 periods - Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous. Before the Triassic, primitive life had built up in the oceans and seas, and some lifeforms finally had crawled onto land during the Paleozoic era. With that, life had become well established, but then came the Permian-Triassic mass extinction, the worst extinction event in the history of the planet. At the end of the Triassic, another extinction event cleared the way for dinosaurs to become the dominant set of species in the Jurassic. Though the Triassic does not have as interesting a list of creatures as those in the Jurassic and Cretaceous, such as Tyrannosaurus rex, Stegosaurus, Pterodactyls, Brontosaurus, and the like, the life which reclaimed the Earth and then thrived during this period was no less important. Life during the Triassic spent nearly 60% of its time recovering from the Permian-Triassic extinction event, roughly 30 million years. What had been built up was then slammed by nature, effectively clearing the board once more for new species to take over. The Triassic Period: The History and Legacy of the Geologic Era that Witnessed the Rise of Dinosaurs looks at the development of the era, the extinction events that preceded it, and how dinosaurs began to evolve in the Late Triassic. Along with pictures depicting important people, places, and events, you will learn about the Triassic Period like never before.

This book documents timely and systematically marvelous fossils (plants and sporopollen) related to the biggest mass extinction of the Permian–Triassic transition. Numerous beautiful pictures and comprehensive records on the plants of this unique and critical interval of geohistory are presented in this book. It greatly contributes to understanding of the Permian–Triassic plant diversity and evolution. For geologists, it is important to understand the Permian–Triassic crisis, and for students, it is attractive to learn about the plants’ response to palaeoclimatic changes.