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Summary:

260 million years ago, life on Earth suffered wave after wave of cataclysmic extinctions, with the worst--the end-Permian extinction--wiping out nearly every species on the planet. This book delves into the mystery behind these extinctions and sheds light on the fateful role the primeval supercontinent, known as Pangea, may have played in causing these global catastrophes. Drawing on the latest discoveries as well as his own field expeditions to remote corners of the world, Paul Wignall reveals what scientists are only now beginning to understand about the most prolonged period of environmental crisis in Earth's history. He describes how a series of unprecedented extinction events swept across the planet in a span of eighty million years, rapidly killing marine and terrestrial life on a scale more devastating than the dinosaur extinctions that would come later. Wignall shows how these extinctions--some of which have only recently been discovered--all coincided with gigantic volcanic eruptions of flood basalt lavas that occurred when the world's landmasses were united into a single vast expanse. Unraveling one of the great enigmas of ancient Earth, this book also explains how the splitting apart of Pangea into the continents we know today ushered in a new age of vibrant and more resilient life on our planet.--Adapted from book jacket.

Table of Contents:

• Machine generated contents note: ch. 1 Time of Dying
• ch. 2 Extinction in the Shadows
• ch. 3 Killing Seas
• ch. 4 Troubled Times in the Triassic
• ch. 5 Triassic Downfall
• ch. 6 Pangea's Final Blow
• ch. 7 Pangea's Death and the Rise of Resilience.

Author/Creator:

Wignall, P. B.

Languages:

English

Language Notes:

Item content: English

Main Work:

The worst of times: how life on earth survived eighty million years of extinctions [by Wignall, P.B.]

Subjects:

Mass extinctions

Extinction (Biology)

Survival

General Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.
Description based on print version record.

Physical Description:

1 online resource.

Call Numbers:

QE721.2.E97 W54 2015eb

ISBNs:

9781400874248 (electronic bk.)
1400874246 (electronic bk.)
9780691142098 (hardcover, acid-free paper) [Invalid]
0691142092 (hardcover, acid-free paper) [Invalid]
0691176027 [Invalid]
9780691176024 [Invalid]

Other Standard Numbers:

[Unknown Type]: 40025347532

OCLC Numbers:

919340597

Other Control Numbers:

EBC2048377 (source: MiAaPQ)
[Unknown Type]: ybp12428313