| Anotation: | Distribution, diversification, and extinction of marine organisms is fundamentally determined by factors that directly or indirectly affect their physiological processes. Presently, it is hypothesized that significant changes in temperature and seawater chemistry and changes in water-mass stratification triggered the end-Triassic mass extinction of marine invertebrates. Empirical testing of such hypotheses, however, requires generation of temporally- and spatially-explicit databases with paleotemperature estimates derived from geochemical and paleoecological proxies. Our goal is to determine temperature means, minima, and maxima, and onshore-offshore gradients in temperature during the Rhaetian and Early Jurassic (Hettangian-Pleinsbachian) in the NW Tethys (Western Carpathians and Eastern Alps) on the basis of brachiopods, bivalves, and foraminifers, using paleoecological analyses, stable isotopes, and Mg/Ca ratio, and to assess extinction selectivity in respect to population abundance and body size.
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