中国科学院南京地质古生物研究所机构知识库

The global End-Devonian Hangenberg Event was one of the most important mass extinction events during the Phanerozoic eon. The stratigraphical, paleontological, and sedimentological evolution of strata equivalent to the Hangenberg Event have been widely investigated in three depositional environments of shallow-marine plat-form, of margin and upper slope, and of deep-water facies along the South China Platform. In this representative region within the eastern Paleotethys, the volcanic tuffs, storm deposits, and microbialites deposited during the time of the Hangenberg Event differ from the record of the Hangenberg Crisis in the Rhenish Slate Mountains of Germany, which is a standard for the western Paleotethys. The Upper Crisis Interval (so-called Stockum Lime-stone Event) in the Rhenish record is interpreted as correlative to the aftermath of the Hangenberg Event in South China rather than a crisis record per se. The unique Cap Microbialite of peloids and oncoids in South China is linked to onset of a new shallow-marine ecosystem characterized by microbe resurgence during a delayed biotic recovery. This microbialite resurgence in association with low-diversity metazoan ecosystems may be a common feature of post-extinction episodes. The new synthesis of records from South China provide insights into global changes that contributed to the Hangenberg biotic extinctions.