Permian–Triassic extinction event

The Permian–Triassic extinction event, also known as the P–Tr extinction, the P–T extinction, the End-Permian Extinction, and colloquially as the Great Dying, formed the boundary between the Permian and Triassic geologic periods, as well as between the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras, approximately 252 million years ago. It is the Earth's most severe known extinction event, with up to 96% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrate species becoming extinct. It was the largest known mass extinction of insects. Some 57% of all biological families and 83% of all genera became extinct. Because so much biodiversity was lost, the recovery of land-dwelling life took significantly longer than after any other extinction event, possibly up to 10 million years. Studies in Bear Lake County, near Paris, Idaho, showed a relatively quick rebound in a localized marine ecosystem, taking around 2 million years to recover, suggesting that the impact of the extinction may have been felt less severely in some areas than others.Until 2000, it was thought that rock sequences spanning the Permian–Triassic boundary were too few and contained too many gaps for scientists to reliably determine its details. However, it is now possible to date the extinction with millennial precision. U–Pb zircon dates from five volcanic ash beds from the Global Stratotype Section and Point for the Permian–Triassic boundary at Meishan, China, establish a high-resolution age model for the extinction – allowing exploration of the links between global environmental perturbation, carbon cycle disruption, mass extinction, and recovery at millennial timescales. The extinction occurred between 251.941 ± 0.037 and 251.880 ± 0.031 Ma ago, a duration of 60 ± 48 ka. A large (approximately 0.9%), abrupt global decrease in the ratio of the stable isotope 13C to that of 12C, coincides with this extinction, and is sometimes used to identify the Permian–Triassic boundary in rocks that are unsuitable for radiometric dating. Further evidence for environmental change around the P–Tr boundary suggests an 8 °C (14 °F) rise in temperature, and an increase in CO2 levels by 2000 ppm (for comparison, the concentration immediately before the industrial revolution was 280 ppm, and the amount today is about 410 ppm). There is also evidence of increased ultraviolet radiation reaching the earth, causing the mutation of plant spores.Marine invertebrates suffered the greatest losses during the P–Tr extinction. Evidence of this was found in samples from south China sections at the P–Tr boundary. Here, 286 out of 329 marine invertebrate genera disappear within the final two sedimentary zones containing conodonts from the Permian. The decrease in diversity was probably caused by a sharp increase in extinctions, rather than a decrease in speciation.Earlier analyses indicated that life on Earth recovered quickly after the Permian extinctions, but this was mostly in the form of disaster taxa, opportunist organisms such as the hardy Lystrosaurus. Research published in 2006 indicates that the specialized animals that formed complex ecosystems, with high biodiversity, complex food webs and a variety of niches, took much longer to recover. It is thought that this long recovery was due to the successive waves of extinction, which inhibited recovery, and prolonged environmental stress to organisms, which continued into the Early Triassic. Research indicates that recovery did not begin until the start of the mid-Triassic, 4 to 6 million years after the extinction; and some writers estimate that the recovery was not complete until 30 Ma after the P–Tr extinction, i.e. in the late Triassic.Pinpointing the exact causes of the Permian–Triassic extinction event is difficult, mostly because it occurred over 250 million years ago, and since then much of the evidence that would have pointed to the cause has been destroyed or is concealed deep within the Earth under many layers of rock. The sea floor is also completely recycled every 200 million years by the ongoing process of plate tectonics and seafloor spreading, leaving no useful indications beneath the ocean.