title: Abiotic forcing of plankton evolution in the Cenozoic.
abstract: We characterize the evolutionary radiation of planktic foraminifera by the test size distributions of entire assemblages in more than 500 Cenozoic marine sediment samples, including more than 1 million tests. Calibration of Holocene size patterns with environmental parameters and comparisons with Cenozoic paleoproxy data show a consistently positive correlation between test size and surface-water stratification intensity. We infer that the observed macroevolutionary increase in test size of planktic foraminifera through the Cenozoic was an adaptive response to intensifying surface-water stratification in low latitudes, which was driven by polar cooling.
authors.affiliation: Department of Earth Sciences, Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (ETH) Zürich, and University of Zürich, ETH-Zentrum, CH-8092 Zürich, Switzerland. d.schmidt@gl.rhul.ac.uk
authors.forename: Daniela N
authors.initials: DN
authors.lastname: Schmidt
authors.forename: Hans R
authors.initials: HR
authors.lastname: Thierstein
authors.forename: Jörg
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Bollmann
authors.forename: Ralf
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Schiebel
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D002980:Climate; D017753:Ecosystem; D056890:Eukaryota / Q000737:chemistry / Q000166:cytology; D005843:Geography; D010103:Oxygen Isotopes / Q000032:analysis; D010933:Plankton / Q000737:chemistry / Q000166:cytology; D012623:Seawater; D013696:Temperature; D013995:Time; D015048:Zooplankton / Q000737:chemistry / Q000166:cytology
chemical_list: D010103:Oxygen Isotopes