Protracted carbon burial following the Early Jurassic Toarcian Oceanic Anoxic Event (Posidonia Shale, Lower Saxony Basin, Germany)

Celestino, R.F.S.; Ruhl, M. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8170-0399; Dickson, A.J.; Idiz, E.; Jenkyns, H. C.; Leng, M.J. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1115-5166; Mattioli, E.; Minisini, D.; Hesselbo, S. P.. 2024 Protracted carbon burial following the Early Jurassic Toarcian Oceanic Anoxic Event (Posidonia Shale, Lower Saxony Basin, Germany). International Journal of Earth Sciences, 113 (8). 2023-2041. 10.1007/s00531-024-02477-9

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Abstract/Summary

Lower Jurassic marine basins across the northwest European epicontinental shelf were commonly marked by deposition of organic-rich black shales. Organic-carbon burial was particularly widespread during the Toarcian Oceanic Anoxic Event (T-OAE: also known as the Jenkyns Event) with its accompanying negative carbon-isotope excursion (nCIE). Lower Toarcian black shales in central and southern Germany are known as the Posidonia Shale Formation (Posidonienschiefer) and are thought to have formed during the T-OAE nCIE. Here, we present stratigraphic (carbon-isotope, Rock–Eval, calcareous nannofossil) data from the upper Pliensbachian and lower Toarcian strata from a core drilled on the northern flank of the Lower Saxony Basin, north–west Germany. The bio- and chemostratigraphic framework presented demonstrates that (i) the rock record of the T-OAE at the studied locality registered highly condensed sedimentation and/or multiple hiatuses and (ii) the deposition of organic-rich black shale extended significantly beyond the level of the T-OAE, thereby contrasting with well-studied sections of the Posidonia Shale in southern Germany but showing similarities with geographically nearby basins such as the Paris Basin (France). Prolonged and enhanced organic-carbon burial represents a negative feedback mechanism in the Earth system, with locally continued environmental perturbance accelerating the recovery of the global climate from T-OAE-associated hyperthermal conditions, whilst also accelerating a return to more positive δ 13 C values in global exogenic carbon pools. Graphical abstract

Item Type:	Publication - Article
Digital Object Identifier (DOI):	10.1007/s00531-024-02477-9
ISSN:	1437-3254
Date made live:	30 Jan 2025 14:45 +0 (UTC)
URI:	https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/538833

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