Worst mass extinctions occur when temperatures are the warmest
Rhett A. Butler, mongabay.com October 24, 2007 Comparing ancient
records of marine and terrestrial diversity with historical
temperature estimates, researchers from the Universities of York
and Leeds found a close correlation between Earth climate and
extinctions over the past 520 million years: higher extinction
rates occur at higher temperatures. "We found that over the
fossil record as a whole, the higher the temperatures have been,
the higher the extinctions have been," lead author Peter Mayhew,
a University of York ecologist, told the Associated Press. "Our
results provide the first clear evidence that global climate may
explain substantial variation in the fossil record in a simple
and consistent manner. If our results hold for current warming -
the magnitude of which is comparable with the long-term
fluctuations in Earth climate - they suggest that extinctions
will increase," said Mayhew. The researchers note that four of
the five historica