The Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the high temperatures that marked the end of the Paleocene and start of the Eocene periods, about 50m years ago. Over c1000 years, global temperatures rose more than 5 C on average and stayed that way for c100,000 years more, with the surface of seas in the Arctic being as warm as those in the subtropics. There were widespread extinctions, changes in ocean currents, and there was much less oxygen in the sea depths. The rise has been attributed to an increase of carbon dioxide and methane in the atmosphere, though it is not yet known conclusively what the source of those gases was. One theory is that a rise in carbon dioxide, perhaps from volcanoes, warmed up the globe enough for warm water to reach the bottom of the oceans and so release methane from frozen crystals in the sea bed. The higher the temperature rose and the longer the water was warm, the more methane was released. Scientists have been studying a range of sources from this long period, from ice samples to fossils, to try to understand more about possible causes.

→ Listen on BBC Sounds website

Guests

• Dame Jane Francis 8 episodes
  Professor of Palaeoclimatology at the British Antarctic Survey
• Mark Maslin 2 episodes
  Professor of Palaeoclimatology at University College London
• Tracy Aze No other episodes
  Lecturer in Marine Micropaleontology at the University of Leeds

Reading list

• The Cradle of Humanity: How the Changing Landscape of Africa Made Us So Smart
  Mark Maslin (Oxford University Press, 2017) Google Books →
• Climate: A Very Short Introduction
  Mark Maslin (Oxford University Press, 2014) Google Books →
• Earth's Climate: Past and Future
  William F. Ruddiman (W. H. Freeman, 2001) Google Books →
• Earth System History
  Steven M. Stanley (W. H. Freeman, 2008) Google Books →

Related episodes

• Mammals
  
  13 Oct, 2005 590 Animals (Zoology)
• The Late Devonian Extinction
  
  11 Mar, 2021 560 Fossils and prehistoric life
• Ice Ages
  
  14 Feb, 2013 550 Earth sciences and geology
• Ageing the Earth
  
  20 Nov, 2003 550 Earth sciences and geology
• The Cambrian Period
  
  17 Feb, 2005 560 Fossils and prehistoric life
• The Permian-Triassic Boundary
  
  28 Jun, 2007 550 Earth sciences and geology
• Ediacara Biota
  
  9 Jul, 2009 560 Fossils and prehistoric life
• Extremophiles
  
  25 Jun, 2015 570 Biology
• Catastrophism
  
  30 Jan, 2014 550 Earth sciences and geology
• The Bronze Age Collapse
  
  16 Jun, 2016 930 History of the Ancient World

Experimental. For more related episodes, visit the visual explorer.

---

Programme ID: b08hpmmf

Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08hpmmf

Auto-category: 550 (Earth sciences & geology)

Hello (First sentence from this episode)

Hello, about 50 million years ago the Earth's climate changed faster than at any time in our geological record, reaching temperatures much higher than they are today.