Acta Zoologica Cracoviensia, 38(1) 1995

Issue:

VOL 38(1) 1995

Keywords:

Pliocene, Pleistocene, Africa, Europe, mammals, evolution, climate

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Plio-Pleistocene correlations between climatic change and evolution in terrestrial mammals: the 2.5 ma event in Africa and Europe

• Alan TURNER

Abstract:

Climatic change has been a marked feature of the past five million years. Among several stepwise changes known from this time span, the onset of the first northern hemisphere glaciations at ca. 2.5 ma stands out as an event of particularly global impact. Any causal relationship between climatic and evolutionary changes should therefore be most apparent in its aftermath. A survey of the terrestrial mammal faunas of Africa and Europe from earlier Pliocene to Middle Pleistocene times indicates just such a relationship in patterns of lineage turnover and within-species changes.