Search results for "mesozoic"
showing 4 items of 84 documents
Ice age at the Middle–Late Jurassic transition?
2003
A detailed record of sea surface temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere based on migration of marine invertebrate fauna (ammonites) and isotopic thermometry (δ18O values of shark tooth enamel) indicates a severe cooling at the Middle–Late Jurassic transition (MLJT), about 160 Ma ago. The magnitude of refrigeration (1–3°C for lower middle latitudes) and its coincidence in time with an abrupt global-scale fall of sea level documented through sequence stratigraphy are both suggestive of continental ice formation at this time. Ice sheets may have developed over the high-latitude mountainous regions of Far-East Russia. The drastic cooling just post-dated the Middle–Late Callovian widespread dep…
Biology of the sauropod dinosaurs: the evolution of gigantism
2010
The herbivorous sauropod dinosaurs of the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods were the largest terrestrial animals ever, surpassing the largest herbivorous mammals by an order of magnitude in body mass. Several evolutionary lineages among Sauropoda produced giants with body masses in excess of 50 metric tonnes by conservative estimates. With body mass increase driven by the selective advantages of large body size, animal lineages will increase in body size until they reach the limit determined by the interplay of bauplan, biology, and resource availability. There is no evidence, however, that resource availability and global physicochemical parameters were different enough in the Mesozoic to ha…
Les traces de pas d'amphibiens, de dinosaures et autres reptiles du Mésozoïque français: inventaire et interprétations.
2007
Since the 19th century, thousands of footprints were observed in the geological series of the French Mesozoic. All are located in the Triassic and Jurassic. After a promising beginning, in France, it is only a few papers which will be published in the first half 20th century, unlike the USA and of others countries of Western Europe. One ought to wait about 1950 for a revival and now they are nearly 200 papers which were devoted to the ichnofossils. The literature abundance and the renewed interest of the naturalists for the palichnologic studies decided to us to write a synthesis work. This one begins with a stratigraphic inventory in which, localisation, age and paleontological contents of…
Characteristics of Mesozoic fluvio-lacustrine formations of the western Central African Republic (Carnot Sandstones) by means of mineralogical and ex…
1990
Abstract The so-called Carnot Sandstones, Mesozoic fluvio-lacustrine detrital formation, which stretch over an area of more than 40 000 km 2 in the western part of the Central African Republic, are made of a succession of conglomerates, sandstones and argilites which can reach 300 m in thickness. Heavy mineral analyses and quartz exoscopic studies of this detrital material allow to understand the geology of these formations. The detrital material origin: heavy mineral distribution in the lower levels indicates mostly a meridional origin with a quantitatively poor peripheral supply. The importance of the transport: quartz exoscopic observations show that the main part of the detrital materia…