New palynology-based astronomical and revised 40Ar/39Ar ages for the Eocene maar lake of Messel (Germany)

The annually laminated oil shale from the Eocene maar lake at Messel (Federal State of Hessen, Germany) provides unique paleoenvironmental data for a time interval of ~640 ka during the Paleogene greenhouse phase. As a consequence of orbitally controlled changes in the vegetation in the vicinity of the lake, the lacustrine laminites can now be astronomically tuned. Dating is based on the short eccentricity amplitude modulations of the regional pollen rain and their correlation to the astronomical La2010a/La2010d solutions in combination with a revised 40Ar/39Ar age of a basalt fragment from a lapilli tuff section below the first lacustrine sediments. Depending on different newly suggested ages for the Fish Canyon sanidine used as monitor for neutron irradiation, the age for the eruption at Messel is between 48.27 ± 0.22 and 48.11 ± 0.22 Ma. This allows for the first time the exact correlation of a Paleogene lacustrine sequence to the marine record in Central Europe. The Messel oil shale becomes now slightly older than previously assumed and includes the Ypresian/Lutetian boundary that moves the base of the European Land Mammal Age Geiseltalian (MP 11) into the Lower Eocene. This opens a window for establishing an independent chronostratigraphic framework for Paleogene terrestrial records and their correlation to the marine realm. Furthermore, the study reveals that higher amounts of pollen from “wet” and thermophilous plants indicate less seasonal and more balanced precipitation and slightly higher temperatures during a well-expressed eccentricity minimum

Float, explode or sink: postmortem fate of lung-breathing marine vertebrates

What happens after the death of a marine tetrapod in seawater? Palaeontologists and neontologists have claimed that large lung-breathing marine tetrapods such as ichthyosaurs had a lower density than seawater, implying that their carcasses floated at the surface after death and sank subsequently after leakage of putrefaction gases (or ‘‘carcass explosions’’). Such explosions would thus account for the skeletal disarticulation observed frequently in the fossil record. We examined the taphonomy and sedimentary environment of numerous ichthyosaur skeletons and compared them to living marine tetrapods, principally cetaceans, and measured abdominal pressures in human carcasses. Our data and a review of the literature demonstrate that carcasses sink and do not explode (and spread skeletal elements). We argue that the normally slightly negatively buoyant carcasses of ichthyosaurs would have sunk to the sea floor and risen to the surface only when they remained in shallow water above a certain temperature and at a low scavenging rate. Once surfaced, prolonged floating may have occurred and a carcass have decomposed gradually. Our conclusions are of significance to the understanding of the inclusion of carcasses of lung-breathing vertebrates in marine nutrient recycling. The postmortem fate has essential implications for the interpretation of vertebrate fossil preservation (the existence of complete, disarticulated fossil skeletons is not explained by previous hypotheses), palaeobathymetry, the physiology of modern marine lung-breathing tetrapods and their conservation, and the recovery of human bodies from seawater