Newsletter No. 70
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Newsletter Winter 2006 No. 70 Commission Internationale de Microflore du Paléozoïque CIMP homepage: President: John Marshall http://www.cimp.ulg.ac.be Past President: Florentin Paris Secretary General & Newsletter Editor: Mike Stephenson Treasurer: Philippe Steemans Webmaster: Philippe Steemans I.F.P.S. representatives: Thomas Servais, Ken Higgs Contents Opinion: How do we sell Deep Time? ............................................................................. 2 New President’s message .................................................................................................. 4 Palynos News ..................................................................................................................... 4 Meetings and conferences................................................................................................. 5 CIMP Prague.....................................................................................................................9 CIMP General Meeting minutes.................................................................................... 58 Election of President of CIMP ....................................................................................... 59 New subcommission positions in CIMP ........................................................................ 59 Next CIMP Conference: Cracow 2010?........................................................................ 59 Gallery of Prague photos................................................................................................ 59 Post CIMP Field trip....................................................................................................... 61 Letter from Jiri Bek........................................................................................................ 62 Enigmatic Givetian palynomorphs................................................................................ 64 Taxonomy online ............................................................................................................. 65 PalyWeb ........................................................................................................................... 66 New address .....................................................................................................................67 More contributions ......................................................................................................... 67 Treasurer’s Report CIMP Finances.............................................................................. 68 Participants at Prague. ................................................................................................... 68 CIMP Newsletter Winter 2006 totally unlike that of the Quaternary, Opinion: How do we sell Deep the kind of atmosphere only found in Time? Deep Time. The ice -core record, Mike Stephenson, [email protected] which has enabled reconstruction of atmospheric CO2 at high resolution, The Palaeozoic - the era with which shows that we are, today, at the highest CIMP is primarily concerned - is Deep level of CO2 in the last 420,000 years Time. The phrase Deep Time, meaning and likely higher than any point in the pre-Quaternary time, is turning up a lot last 20,000,000 yrs (IPCC, 2001). CO2 recently. Within the British and is a particularly compelling reason to American geological communities study Deep Time, owing to its questions such as ‘How do we sell relevance to climate change on all Deep Time’ and ‘What is the point of timescales (Crowley and Berner, studying Deep Time?’ are continually 2001). Deep pre-Quaternary time is being asked (e.g. Soreghan et al. 2003, also more than 99% of earth time and Soreghan 2004). I am presently contains most of the big events that involved in organising a symposium at have shaped life and this planet. BGS on the ‘Geological Survey and According to some estimates, rates of Climate Change’, and at least two extinction recorded in the last 50 years delegates have suggested privately to are higher than those at the Permian– me that Deep Time research should not Triassic boundary (PTB). be included because its conclusions are too vague and its data cannot be used easily in climate models because it is too ‘coarse’. They say that Deep Time research cannot contribute to understanding decadal or centennial climate change which is, after all, what governments are mainly interested in. Thus as Palaeozoic palynologists we ought to be ‘selling’ Deep Time, and thinking about the specific benefits that The Monteverde Golden toad was last seen in our period of study (which contains 1989 and is presumed extinct. 33% of toad two major glacial events) and our species are endangered and 120 species have science (which is arguably the only become extinct since the 1980s. For the first palaeontological discipline that can time fungal disease linked to global warming has been suggested as the cause (see Nature provide high enough resolution data in 439, 161-167). the Palaeozoic) can offer. So are we heading for mass extinction It’s true that the Quaternary has told us and is the study of Quaternary climate a lot about the Earth’s climate system. variability enough to understand the Perhaps the most significant and extremes that might be coming? These surprising is that climate can change ideas alone suggest that deep time is quickly, within human lifetimes, and worthy of interest. But deep time study that this record can be preserved at could answer many more questions: high fidelity in ice cores for example. Can ‘tipping points’ of climate change, However, study of the Quaternary e.g. from greenhouse to icehouse, be alone gives a rather myopic view of predicted? How do tectonics influence our climatic past; a view that we must climate in affecting gateways, relief, look beyond, because we are now and the ocean thermohaline entering an atmospheric composition circulation? (see for example Soreghan 2 CIMP Newsletter Winter 2006 et al. 2003). Palaeozoic palynologists other proxies (geochemical, isotopic) have been involved in posing some of in supporting the palynological data these questions and could be and develop a hypothesis of change fundamental in future research, if we which we test most crucially by build on our strengths in corroboration from study of correlated biostratigraphy and sections elsewhere, involving palaeobiogeography and work with biostratigraphy and geochronology. isotope geochemists and Thus palynology is used in the geochronologists. reconstruction of climate change (using its value as a proxy) as well as being important in correlating sections recording change. CIMP palynologists have been involved in this kind of science with particularly strong contributions in the early Palaeozoic, though new palynological work is showing the value of study of the Carboniferous-Permian glacial period in understanding modern glaciation. Computer climate modellers study Deep time: the horizontal Permian Saiq climate by synthesising and Formation above the Precambrian Fiq Formation, Saiq Plateau, Oman. manipulating key processes then viewing the results, whereas palynologists and stratigraphers view the results then deduce the processes. Thus there is a difference in the approach of climate modelers and the palaeontology/stratigraphy community. This historical disparity between the communities should be bridged because we can learn a lot from each other. However neither geologists nor deep time computer climate modellers can resolve questions on decadal or centennial level climate change but we can see the big events in the earth system and distinguish large and important events from small events. New projects that interest me and which might grow from work presently being done at BGS include the role of phytoplankton in controlling ρCO in Looking down on the Fiq Formation, Saiq 2 Plateau, Oman. Lower Palaeozoic to the right, glacial cycles, and the value of new all capped by Permian Saiq Formation. climate proxies such as geologically preserved lignin when studied in Most geological deep time concert with detailed terrestrial palynological research begins with a palynology. But it’s our responsibility rock section which records as palynologists to ensure that the environmental change. We study its evidence of our science is heard, and palynology, then we assess the value of 3 CIMP Newsletter Winter 2006 that the value of the Palaeozoic in that in Cork, Ireland in 2001. But it has climate study is known. now broadened out to be a joint References meeting with the Acritarch Sub- commission. We have, to my Soreghan, G. S. 2004. Deja-vu all over knowledge, never before had a meeting again: Deep Time (climate) is here to in Portugal. Palaeozoic palynology is a stay. Palaois, 19, February 2004. young subject in Portugal and it has Soreghan, G. S., Parrish, J. T. & helped very significantly to understand Maples, C. G. 2003. Geoclimate: the mineral deposits in southern Spain probing the Earth’s climate record at and Portugal. So it is a great all temporal and spatial scales. opportunity to see what they have Eos,Vol. 84, No. 44, 4 November achieved. The details are elsewhere in 2003. this Newsletter. IPCC, 2001, Climate Change 2001, I have also been giving thought to how The Scientific Basis: Cambridge we can better use CIMP as a way of University Press, Cambridge, 881 p. establishing the future of Palaeozoic palynology. CIMP is quite unusual in Crowley, J.C., and Berner, R.A., 2001, that it has very few assets apart from CO2 and climate changes: Science, v. the