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Science 19 November 1999:
Vol. 286. no. 5444, pp. 1531 - 1533
DOI: 10.1126/science.286.5444.1531
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Reports

The Source and Fate of Massive Carbon Input During the Latest Paleocene Thermal Maximum

Miriam E. Katz, 1* Dorothy K. Pak, 2 Gerald R. Dickens, 3 Kenneth G. Miller 1

Lithologic, faunal, seismic, and isotopic evidence from the Blake Nose (subtropical western North Atlantic) links a massive release of biogenic methane ~55.5 million years ago to a warming of deep-ocean and high-latitude surface waters, a large perturbation in the combined ocean-atmosphere carbon cycle (the largest of the past 90 million years), a mass extinction event in benthic faunas, and a radiation of mammalian orders. The deposition of a mud clast interval and seismic evidence for slope disturbance are associated with intermediate water warming, massive carbon input to the global exogenic carbon cycle, pelagic carbonate dissolution, a decrease in dissolved oxygen, and a benthic foraminiferal extinction event. These events provide evidence to confirm the gas hydrate dissociation hypothesis and identify the Blake Nose as a site of methane release.

1 Department of Geological Sciences, Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA.
2 Department of Geological Sciences and Marine Science Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA.
3 School of Earth Sciences, James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland 4811, Australia.
*   To whom correspondence should be addressed.

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