Research Paper on Climate Change and Dinosaurs

By comparing rock strata bearing sauropodomorph fossils to variations in Earth’s magnetic field, scientists were able to track the dinosaurs’ trip from South America to Greenland. Using that timeframe, the researchers discovered that the organisms’ northward march coincided with a large drop in CO2, suggesting that climate-related obstacles had been removed.

The sauropodomorphs were a group of plant-eating dinosaurs with long necks that included both massive sauropods like Seismosaurus and their smaller ancestors.

Sauropodomorphs inhabited mostly in what is now northern Argentina and southern Brazil around 230 million years ago. However, these early dinosaurs picked up and moved as far north as Greenland at some point.

However, when they may have made that voyage has remained a mystery. Greenland and the Americas were merged into the supercontinent Pangea during the time. There were no seas in the way, and the mountains were rather straightforward to navigate, he claims.

It would have taken the dinosaurs around 20 years to reach Greenland if they had traveled at a leisurely rate of one to two kilometers every day.

However, during the Late Triassic Epoch, which lasted from 233 million to 215 million years ago, Earth’s carbon dioxide levels were extremely high, reaching up to 4,000 parts per million.

According to climatic projections, high CO2 levels would have resulted in hyper-arid deserts and significant temperature changes, which might have served as a barrier to the huge monsters.

There would have been few vegetation available for herbivores to survive the trek north for much of that time period, due to extensive deserts reaching north and south of the equator.

Carbon dioxide levels in Greenland plunged to 2,000 parts per million around the time sauropodomorphs arrived, making the environment more travel-friendly for herbivores.

The cause of this decline in carbon dioxide, which has been documented in climatic records from South America and Greenland, is unknown, but it did allow for a northward movement.

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