BIOA02H3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Industrial Revolution, Anthropocene, Background Extinction Rate
16 Apr 2018
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Define and explain the significance of all red terms: we have experience 5 known major extinction events since the beginning of earth"s history. Both direct and indirect causes were responsible for these events. Direct causes were rapid changes in temperature which are often linked to changes in co2 levels. Changes in sea level were also responsible as they contributed to the melting/formation of continental ice sheets. Effects on organisms were: the petm, glaciation in antarctica and the pleistocene ice ages lead into another minor extinction event called the holocene. These types of minor events typically lasted 1000 years, however, this event lasted 15000 years! The effects on organisms were: scientists think that we are currently facing another major extinction event called the. On average, the number of average species that go extinct from 1-10 my are around. Currently, we are facing a mass extinction event where the extinction rate is 100 times larger than the background extinction rate.
