沉积学报2025，Vol.43Issue(6)：1935-1951,17.DOI:10.14027/j.issn.1000-0550.2024.125
汞示踪古新世—始新世极热事件火山沉积记录研究进展
A Review of Mercury as Proxy for Volcanism During the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum
摘要
Abstract
[Significance]Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution,human activities have resulted in the sustained release of greenhouse gases,including carbon dioxide(CO2)into the atmosphere.This has been primarily driven by the combustion of fossil fuels,and threatens profound climatic disturbances,environmental transformations and widespread biological crises.Similarly,the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum(PETM,～56 Ma)represents a period of massive carbon release into the atmosphere,occurring at a rate strikingly comparable to current anthropo-genic carbon emissions.It is of paramount importance to gain a comprehensive understanding of the processes and mechanisms that regulated carbon release during the PETM.Such knowledge can provide valuable insights into the impact of these emissions on the Earth's habitability.Furthermore,these findings have significant implications for our attempts to gain an understanding of present-day and future climate change.It is consequently of the highest scientific importance to study this ancient climatic event,as it offers a natural experiment for evaluating the potential consequences of contemporary carbon emissions on global climate dynamics and ecological stability.[Progress]The trigger of the PETM has been the subject of considerable debate among scholars in the past few decades.Despite extensive research,the exact mechanism that instigated the massive carbon release during the PETM remains unresolved,although the findings of recent studies have indicated a temporal correlation between magmatism in the North Atlantic Igneous Province(NAIP)and the PETM.This evidence suggests that volcanic activity in NAIP was likely to be have been the trigger of the climatic perturbation.While this hypothesis adds to our insights into the triggering mechanisms of PETM events,our understanding of the exact cause-and-effect relationship between volcanic activity and climate fluctuations during this transition period remains incomplete.A significant challenge to a full establishing this relationship is the difficulty of accurately tracing volcanic activity in the sedimentary record during this period,due to the complex nature of volcanic products and their subsequent alteration over millions of years and the problem of identifying and distinguishing between different volcanic events.Recently,mercury(Hg)concentrations and their isotopic compositions in sediments have emerged as promising tools for tracing volcanic activity throughout geological history.However,in the present study,the focus on the Hg record of the PETM was largely limited to near-shore areas proximal to the NAIP eruption sites.Few studies have explored the Hg concentra-tions in sediments from open-ocean regions located at a considerable distance from the eruption centers,leaving a significant gap in our understanding of the broader extent of the influence of the NAIP.The spatial limitations of this study restricted our ability to fully assess the global impact of volcanic emissions on the Earth's climate and ecosystems during the PETM.[Conclusions and Prospects]This paper provides a comprehensive review of the current state of research on the use of mercury deposition as a tracer of ancient volcanic activity during the PETM.It identifies existing research limitations and suggests key directions for future studies.It also reviews the possible relationship between the volcanic activity of the NAIP and the climatic events of the PETM,emphasizing the need for further interdisciplinary research to resolve outstanding issues and refine our understanding of this critical period in the Earth's history.关键词
古新世—始新世极热事件/北大西洋火成岩省/汞浓度及同位素/海洋缺氧Key words
Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum/North Atlantic Igneous Province/mercury concentrations and isotopes/ocean deoxygenation分类
天文与地球科学引用本文复制引用
YANG Chen,LIN WenJie,JIN SiMin,LI MingSong,SHEN Jun..汞示踪古新世—始新世极热事件火山沉积记录研究进展[J].沉积学报,2025,43(6):1935-1951,17.基金项目
国家重点研发计划(2022YFF0802900) （2022YFF0802900）
国家自然科学基金项目(42405053)[National Key Research and Development Program of China,No.2022YFF0802900 （42405053）
National Natural Science Foundation of China,No.42405053] （）
