**Summary: Causes of Woolly Mammoth Extinction — Environmental Factors and Human Activities**

The extinction of the woolly mammoth was driven by a combination of environmental changes and human influence, illustrating the complexity of species loss and the significant impact humans can have on prehistoric ecosystems.

**Climate Change and Environmental Shifts:**
The woolly mammoth thrived during the Last Glacial Period (the Ice Age), when global temperatures were much lower than today and large parts of the earth were covered in ice.

As the glaciers receded and the climate warmed rapidly at the end of the Ice Age, mammoth habitats shifted dramatically.

The tundra and grasslands—essential for mammoth survival—gave way to forests and wetlands, reducing available food and living space.

Additionally, changing atmospheric CO₂ levels at various times in Earth’s history have been linked to environmental stress, including ocean acidification and loss of biodiversity.

While the Permian extinction was much earlier and not directly tied to mammoths, the pattern of rapid climate shifts shows how whole ecosystems can be destabilized, threatening species that cannot adapt fast enough.

**Mass Extinctions Context:**
Current research warns that Earth is undergoing a ‘sixth mass extinction’, where species disappear far faster than at natural background rates.

This rapid decline, seen both in historic events and today, often correlates with significant environmental disturbances—climate change being key among them.

Mass extinctions are catastrophic and fast, eradicating a large portion of plant and animal life.

While the end-Pleistocene event (which saw mammoths disappear) was not a mass extinction at this scale, it fits the pattern of quick, widespread loss driven by environmental upheaval.

**Role of Humans:**
Early humans arrived in mammoth territories toward the end of the mammoth’s range.

Archaeological evidence—including stone tools and kill sites—suggests humans hunted mammoths for meat, bones, and hides.

The large size and herd behavior of mammoths may have made them attractive targets for human groups, especially as their numbers dwindled and their habitats shrank.

Increasing evidence points to humans playing a significant role in pushing small, fragmented populations to extinction, particularly on isolated refuges like Wrangel Island, where mammoths persisted thousands of years after vanishing from the mainland.

**Interactions and Lessons:**
The extinction of the mammoth was not due to a single cause but the interplay of rapid environmental change and human activities.

As habitats changed and populations shrank, mammoths had little time to adapt or recover.

Human hunting pressure further hastened their demise, demonstrating how even early cultures could deeply affect megafauna and ecosystems.

**Takeaway:**
Mammoth extinction shows that large animals are particularly vulnerable to simultaneous shifts in climate and human activity.

Studying their disappearance helps us understand the cascading effects of environmental change and human impact, providing insights relevant to current biodiversity loss and conservation efforts.

**Summary: Extinction of the Woolly Mammoth—Environmental Factors & Human Impact**

The woolly mammoth's extinction has been widely debated, centering on two main factors: climate/environmental changes and human activities.

Analysis, including DNA studies of over 1,500 modern plants and animals and computer models, shows a complex interplay between these causes.

**Climate Change as a Primary Driver:**
New genetic and environmental data indicate the woolly mammoth survived multiple ice ages, but the most recent climate shifts proved catastrophic.

A crucial factor was not just *climate change* itself, but the *speed* and magnitude of these changes.

As global temperatures fluctuated and habitats transitioned towards drier, colder, and less productive ecosystems, vegetation patterns shifted rapidly, leading to a scarcity of mammoths’ preferred food plants.

Their large bodies required substantial resources, and the new environments could not sustain them.

The research highlights that mammoths could not adapt quickly enough to these dramatic landscape and climate transformations.

Beyond just the mammoth, the decline of "megafauna" (large animals like mammoths, cave lions) had global consequences, reducing the transport of vital nutrients (phosphorus, calcium, magnesium) by as much as 90%.

This affected the entire ecosystem, demonstrating the wide-reaching fallout from a single species' extinction.

**The Role of Humans:**
While the article presents research suggesting early human hunting alone may not have been the decisive factor (with some models claiming "people did not have any influence"), the timing of mammoth decline often overlaps with the spread of Homo sapiens and improved hunting tools.

The presence of early humans likely added additive pressures, for instance, by modifying landscapes (deforestation, grassland burning) and competing for resources, which, when combined with climate stress, critically jeopardized mammoth populations.

Evidence from other extinctions—such as the moa in New Zealand, which disappeared rapidly after human settlement—supports the idea that arrival of humans can accelerate extinction processes, even when climate conditions are also changing.

**What This Tells Us:**
The extinction of the mammoth offers broader lessons about prehistoric extinctions.

It demonstrates how rapid environmental changes—whether natural or humans-induced—can exceed the adaptability of even long-surviving species.

Moreover, the cumulative impact of both climate change and human activity often proves more fatal than either factor alone.

Thus, the mammoth’s demise emphasizes the profound impact humans can have on ecosystems, both past and present, and provides a cautionary case for the vulnerabilities of today’s large mammals amidst ongoing global change.

**Summary of Causes of Woolly Mammoth Extinction: Environmental Change and Human Impact**

During the last ice age (2.6 million to 11,700 years ago), the Earth supported many large animal species—or "megafauna"—including the woolly mammoth.

However, by the end of the ice age and in the thousands of years that followed, most of these giant animals disappeared.

The extinction of the woolly mammoth is a classic example of megafaunal loss, and its causes illustrate the interplay between environmental changes and human activities.

**Environmental Factors:**
- **Climate Change:** The transition from the last ice age to the current, warmer Holocene epoch led to significant changes in climate.

As temperatures rose, habitats suitable for cold-adapted animals like the mammoth shrank dramatically.

Warming led to the retreat of steppe-tundra mosaics—open, grassy plains that supported mammoth populations.

- **Vegetation Shifts:** With fewer large herbivores present, and as the climate changed, forests expanded and grasslands contracted.

Mammoths, dependent on open habitats with abundant grasses and sedges, struggled as their food sources declined.

- **Water and Oxygen Stress:** Climate change often brought droughts and altered water availability, further stressing the megafauna.

These changes also influenced species’ ability to adapt, especially in regions with limited ranges.

**Human Activities:**
- **Hunting Pressure:** The arrival of modern humans coincided with the decline of mammoth populations.

Evidence suggests that humans hunted mammoths for meat, hides, and bones.

Even low levels of sustained hunting could have driven slow-reproducing populations toward extinction.

- **Fire and Landscape Modification:** After humans arrived, fire became a more regular part of many ecosystems.

Human-set fires could alter habitats, promoting vegetation less favorable to mammoths and reducing their range.

- **Ecosystem Disruption:** The combination of hunting, land burning, and other human impacts pushed ecosystems toward "tipping points," causing cascading losses of species and habitats.

**Wider Lessons & Modern Parallels:**
- Scientists debate whether natural climate changes or human activity—or a combination—drove most megafaunal extinctions.

Current research increasingly supports the idea that both were important, and their effects compounded each other.

- The extinction of the mammoth and other Ice Age giants shows how sensitive large species are to rapid environmental changes and human impacts.

This lesson is relevant today as modern species face climate-induced habitat loss, pollution, and overexploitation.

- Understanding the mammoth’s extinction helps us predict and potentially prevent future biodiversity crises, emphasizing the importance of habitat preservation, mitigating climate change, and managing human impacts on ecosystems.

In summary, the woolly mammoth’s extinction resulted from a synergy between rapid climate change and the expanding influence of early humans, which together transformed the mammoth's ecosystem beyond its ability to adapt or survive.

Here are the main nuggets of information derived from the extracts you provided, focusing on themes related to extinction, climate change, and human impact on past ecosystems, which can help illustrate broader patterns relevant to the woolly mammoth’s extinction:

- Environmental change, especially shifts in climate and sea level, have historically played a critical role in driving extinction events, as seen in the disappearance of marine animals in Antarctica millions of years ago.

Warming temperatures and rising seas allowed new species to invade and replaced cold-adapted ones, showing how ecological barriers can break down quickly with environmental disruption.

- These extinctions were not isolated: they are often part of complex, interconnected global changes including temperature shifts, ocean acidification, and habitat loss.

- Ecosystem collapse does not require the disappearance of every species.

**Summary: Causes of Woolly Mammoth Extinction — Environmental Factors and Human Activities**

The extinction of the woolly mammoth was driven by a combination of environmental changes and human influence, illustrating the complexity of species loss and the significant impact humans can have on prehistoric ecosystems.

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In-Breeding Likely Didn't End the Last of the Mammoth Population

A study of the last likely surviving mammoth population shows that genetics from in-breeding likely did not lead to their demise.

By Paul Smaglik
Jun 27, 2024 6:20 PMJun 27, 2024 6:22 PM
Wrangel Island mammoth tusk (Credit: Love Dalén)

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It would seem obvious that rising sea levels that cut off the last population of woolly mammoths on Wrangel Island from the Siberian coast 10,000 years ago caused in-breeding, leading to their eventual extinction. But a new genetic analysis, reported in Cell, counters that claim.

That result was unexpected, since an earlier report indicated that the mammoth population likely built up harmful genetic mutations, according to Love Dalén, a scientist with the Centre for Palaeogenetics of Sweden, and one of the paper’s authors.

“I was fairly surprised both at how few the mammoths on Wrangel Island were in the beginning (less than 10 individuals), and that we did not find any evidence for an accumulation of highly deleterious mutations,” Dalén says. He calls the relative lack of harmful mutations surprising, because an earlier paper published in 2017 in PLOS Genetics predicted they may have played a factor.

Natural Selection and Genetic Drift

The genetic story of this population — which likely started from 8 individuals and grew to 200 to 300 mammoths over 6,000 years within 20 generations — is a bit more complicated. Two sometimes competing genetic factors were at play.

Natural selection tends to purge harmful variants, because offspring carrying them would be less likely to survive. But genetic drift works to preserve mutations across generations.

This effect tends to be stronger in smaller populations, so it would make sense that it would impact the Wrangel Island mammoths.

Read More: Rapid Evolution Changes Species in Real Time

What Made the Island Mammoths go Extinct?

Although it appears that these two genetic forces competed, it wasn’t necessarily a fair fight.

“Whereas genetic drift affects all deleterious mutations in the same way, natural selection will be stronger the more deleterious a mutation is,” says Dalén. “That way, natural selection is expected to remove the very deleterious mutations from the population, while genetic drift leads to an increase in slightly deleterious ones.”

Therefore, over time, the most harmful mutations were purged, while a bunch of relatively innocuous ones remained. So, if inbreeding didn’t do in the mammoths, what did?

“This leaves us with some other possibilities, such as a disease outbreak, some sort of tundra fire, or very short-term climatic perturbation, where the latter two could have ruined the plant growth for one or a few seasons, which could have had disastrous consequences for such a small population,” Dalén says.

Read More: How Do We Know When a Species Is Extinct?

Conservation of Today

Although the interplay between natural selection and genetic drift didn’t appear to wipe out the mammoths of yore, it still has implications for conservation efforts of today.

For example, conservationists wishing to preserve a species that has almost gone extinct, but has partially recovered, could look to the Wrangel Island mammoths. The implication is that moving a few individuals between two isolated populations could slow genetic drift.

The study’s authors have yet to analyze DNA from the most recent Wrangel Island mammoths. However, researchers have found fossils from the last 300 years of the mammoths’ existence and plan to analyze their genomes.

Read More: Scientists Are Trying to Save These Animals From Extinction

Article Sources

Our writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:

Before joining Discover Magazine, Paul Smaglik spent over 20 years as a science journalist, specializing in U.S. life science policy and global scientific career issues. He began his career in newspapers, but switched to scientific magazines. His work has appeared in publications including Science News, Science, Nature, and Scientific American.

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How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

**Climate Change and Environmental Shifts:**
The woolly mammoth thrived during the Last Glacial Period (the Ice Age), when global temperatures were much lower than today and large parts of the earth were covered in ice.

Title:

Content: What we know as the Ice Age, the last long period during which global temperatures dropped dramatically and the polar ice expanded to cover much of the earth, is more properly called the Last Glacial Period (as there have been multiple ice ages).

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It started around 115,000 years ago and lasted for over 100,000 years. In that time many animal lineages rose and fell. In particular, it is known that many large mammal species went extinct during the transition from the Ice Age to the present interglacial period (from around 50,000 to 5,000 years ago).

These extinctions are thought to have occurred due to a combination of a quickly changing climate, changing vegetation and increases in human hunting. These megafauna included some truly huge and charismatic animals, from the iconic woolly mammoth to huge cave bears, to giant sloths standing nearly 12 feet tall! In this list you will find out about some extraordinary (now extinct) animals that lived during the age of ice and snow.

10 now-extinct animals from the Ice Age

1. Neanderthals

Our own species, Homo sapiens, emerged about 300,000 years ago, so persisted through the last ice age. We were not the only ancient humans around, however. Surviving the frigid temperatures along with us were our evolutionary cousins, the Neanderthals. This species of hominid emerged at a similar time to us but went extinct around 40,000 years ago – during the Ice Age.

Theories as to why they went extinct vary, from outcompetion from or diseases introduced by Homo sapiens to assimilation into the human gene pool. However, recent theories suggest that the primary driver might have been climate change. It is thought that despite behavioural and biological adaptations to the cold they simply struggled to survive the frigid conditions and lack of available food. How we survived and they didn’t is an interesting question.

2. Woolly mammoths (Mammuthus primigenius)

Probably the most well-known of all Ice Age animals is the woolly mammoth (in part thanks to the film character Manny!). Woolly mammoths lived from about 300,000 years ago up until about 10,000 years ago. The appearance of these elephant-sized animals is perhaps the best known of any prehistoric creature, due to the many frozen specimens that have been found, with soft tissue preserved.

With their thick coat of hair, large fat reserves, and specially adapted 'antifreeze' blood they were very well adapted to the cold. They were also very important to the survival of ancient humans throughout the Ice Age; their coats, meat and bones provided valuable sources of warmth, food and building materials for homo sapiens and Neanderthals alike.

3. Giant ground sloth (Megatherium americanum)

These beasts were very different to the sloths we know and love today! Standing at a whopping 3.7m when up on hind legs and weighing up to four tonnes (as opposed to the 5kg of a modern sloth), they were truly colossal.

With its ability to walk on its hind legs, it was in fact the largest bipedal mammal of all time. They lived in the woodlands and grasslands of South America, and fossils have been found dating back from around 400,000 years ago to 10,000 years ago. Despite its huge fearsome claws, it was actually a vegetarian, feeding on leaves and grasses.

4. Cave bears (Ursus spelaeus)

Slightly more modest in size, though still pretty massive, was the cave bear. Weighing in at between 400 and 1,000kg, the largest cave bears were comparable in size to modern-day polar bears. They could be found across Europe and Asia, including in the UK.

More like this

We have a very good idea of what they looked like, as in 2020 a perfectly preserved specimen was found in the Russian Arctic, its remains revealed by melting permafrost. Even its teeth and nose were intact.

The specimen was dated to between 22,000 and 39,500 years old, living towards the end of the time of the cave bears, who are thought to have gone extinct 24,000 years ago. It is thought that hunting by humans, as well as competition with them over caves, may have contributed to their disappearance.

5. Dire wolf (Canis dirus)

That’s right, dire wolves are not just fictional pets from Game of Thrones, they were real animals. However, despite the name, and a lot of physical similarities, recent genetic analysis has revealed that they were not actually very closely related to grey wolves at all and were relatively closer to African jackals.

These canids were seemingly a common feature of the American Late Pleistocene landscape (approx. 250,000 to 13,000 years ago), roaming the grasslands, plains, and woods and preying on megafauna including giant ground sloths. There is almost an overabundance of fossil data on this species, with over 4,000 individuals excavated from California’s La Brea tar pits alone.

6. Sabre Tooth Cat (Smilodon genus)

The La Brea tar pits have also been responsible for giving us insights about another iconic Ice Age predator – the sabre tooth cat. More than 3,000 fossilised individuals have been pulled from the ooze, and their teeth in particular have been a valuable source of information about their diets and lifestyle.

Scientists have been able to examine the wear patterns on their iconic gnashers to determine that rather than bringing down very large prey like bison on the open plains, as was previously thought, they most likely fed primarily on smaller forest-dwelling animals like tapirs and deer. They were ambush predators similar to many modern-day big cats.

7. Irish elk (Megaloceros giganteus)

As you can probably guess from the scientific name, this species of deer was BIG. They stood at over 1.8m tall at shoulder height and had the largest antlers of any known deer, extinct or living. These colossal antlers must have been something to behold, spanning up to a whopping 3.5 metres.

Despite the name, this elk was not restricted to Ireland, but some of the most well-preserved fossil specimens have been found there. The most recent remains come from western Russia and have been dated to approximately 7,700 years ago – seemingly another victim of the megafaunal extinction event that occurred around the end of the Ice Age.

8. Giant Beaver (Castoroides genus)

Continuing the theme of larger versions of modern-day animals is the giant beaver, with an average length of about 1.8m. Its teeth were large to match, with some reaching up to 15cm, about the size of a hot dog.

There is no definitive evidence that they built dams as modern beavers do, but it is plausible that these immense incisors could have been used for woodcutting. What we do know is that they had smaller, smoother brains than modern-day beavers, which could indicate that they had less behavioural and social complexity.

9. Megalania (Varanus priscus)

So far this list has focused on mega-mammals, but what about other Ice Age species? Understandably it was hard for cold-blooded species like reptiles to survive frozen ice age temperatures across much of the globe, but in fact, not all of the world was icy, and some places remained habitable.

One of these places was Australia, where giant reptiles ruled. These included huge land-living crocodiles, massive snakes and Megalania – a truly monstrous relative of the Komodo dragon. This monitor lizard reached an estimated length of 7 metres and was a key land predator, at the very top of the food chain.

It has been suggested that the loss of its mega-reptile predators has left the Australian ecosystem out of kilter, allowing introduced mammals to reign unchecked.

10. Diprotodon (Diprotodon genus)

Another feature of the Australian Ice Age landscape was not a reptile, but a huge marsupial mammal – in fact, the largest marsupial to have ever lived. Diprotodon measured an estimated 4m head to tail tip and weighed as much as 3,500 kg, dwarfing the current largest marsupial, the red kangaroo, which checks in at a mere 2.7m and 90kg.

Their closest modern relatives are actually much smaller: wombats and koalas. It also has the distinction of being the only known seasonally migrating marsupial, trekking very far in search of food and watering holes.

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Main image: Artist's impression of a sabre tooth cat. © Daniel Eskridge/Getty

Authors

Leoma WilliamsAnimal behavior researcher and science writer

Leoma Williams is currently studying for a PhD at the University of Manchester, and writes periodically for both the website and print magazine

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How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

from 300,000 years ago up until 10,000 years ago

As the glaciers receded and the climate warmed rapidly at the end of the Ice Age, mammoth habitats shifted dramatically.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

The tundra and grasslands—essential for mammoth survival—gave way to forests and wetlands, reducing available food and living space.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

pastures becoming swampy
food sources disappearing
restricted habitat
shrank grassland

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Additionally, changing atmospheric CO₂ levels at various times in Earth’s history have been linked to environmental stress, including ocean acidification and loss of biodiversity.

Title:

Content: The Sciences

The Late Permian Mass Extinction Explained

Burning coal caused the largest mass extinction in earth’s history — the Late Permian Mass Extinction, or the Great Dying.

By Gabe AllenJul 22, 2022 10:00 AM
(Credit: Catmando/Shutterstock)

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Mass extinctions are evolutionary turning points — brief moments on a geologic time scale that drastically change the course of life on earth. One moment in particular stands out. The Permian-Triassic extinction, aka the Great Dying, eradicated more than 90 percent of earth’s marine species and 75 percent of terrestrial species 252 million years ago. It was the deadliest mass extinction event in the history of our planet, and its legacy lives on in the flora and fauna of the modern world.

The climactic and geochemical triggers for the Great Dying are unsettlingly similar to the effects of anthropogenic climate change. Global warming, ocean acidification and ozone layer-depletion caused ecological collapse.

The organisms that did recover from the extinction, did so slowly. Equatorial regions, which had been scorched beyond recognition, did not regain their characteristic biodiversity for five million years. Global ecosystems lacked both diversity and stability for at least eight million years following the event.

Survivors of the extinction event, though few, eventually repopulated the earth. These organisms are the ancestors of every living thing today. To paleontologists, the End-Permian Mass Extinction is the temporal boundary between the ancient paleozoic fauna and the modern fauna — a theoretical border between our world and a barely-recognizable predecessor.

Finding Precision

As recent as the late 2000s, the research community was significantly divided over what caused the Permian extinction. Some suggested that volcanism was at fault, while others suggested a meteor impact, like the one that wiped out the dinosaurs, caused the extinction.

Those that preferred the volcanic explanation, suspected the Siberian Traps, an expansive region of volcanic rock in present-day Siberia. The formation developed during an unrivaled period of volcanic rock on the ancient supercontinent Pangea.

“It’s the largest continental volcanic event and the largest mass extinction that we’re aware of on earth ever,” says Dr. Lindy Elkins-Tanton, a planetary scientist and professor at Arizona State University. “At the time, we didn’t know what caused either one or if they were definitively related to each other.”

In 2014, Chinese and American researchers made a breakthrough. The team extracted ancient volcanic ash from the Global Stratotype Section and Point for the early Triassic period, a site in Meishan, China that contains sediment that dates to the crisis unambiguously. By analyzing the uranium and lead isotopes contained in the ash, they put a relatively precise date on the extinction: 251.9 million years ago, give or take 70,000 years.

The next step was to date the Siberian Traps. Using the same method, the scientists analyzed samples from the site. “The bulk of this diffusive and explosive volcanism led up to the extinction,” says Elkins-Tanton, who was a part of the research team.

From these two dates, a timeline began to emerge. Intense volcanic activity on the ancient supercontinent of Pangea spewed magma through layers of basalt, coal and organic material. The combustion of these layers produced an immense amount of CO2 as well as other greenhouse gasses and chlorofluorocarbons.

Victims and Survivors

On land, both plants and animals perished in equatorial regions. At further latitudes, mosses and other lycopods began to dominate ecosystems that were once forested with conifers. Our ancestors, the tetrapods, died en masse. Survivors fled from the tropics towards the poles.

Like the mass extinctions before it, the End-Permian had an outsized impact on marine organisms. As CO2 from the atmosphere leached into the water, the ocean became more and more acidic. Simultaneously, high temperatures and cyanobacteria blooms consumed dissolved oxygen until there was little left.

Many organisms that had evolved to construct exoskeletons from minerals, found in ambient seawater, did not survive these changes in marine chemistry. The engineers of Permian reef ecosystems, rugose and tabulate corals, went completely extinct. Vast groups of externally-shelled cephalopods, ancestors of the nautilus, succumbed to the same fate. The End-Permian extinguished the last species of Trilobites as well, a group that had been on the decline since the Ordovician Mass Extinction.

Read more: The First Mass Extinction Event Explained: End-Ordovician

As with any mass-extinction, there were survivors of the Great Dying. Before the event, clam-like brachiopods were plentiful and diverse, but the extinction extinguished them in favor of their cousins, the bivalve mollusks. To this day, bivalves are widespread, while only a few orders of brachiopods remain.

Many researchers have speculated that the End-Permian may have catalyzed diversification among tetrapods. Though the extinction wiped many out permanently, the Early Triassic saw the creatures diversify and expand their ranges rapidly. This “radiation” eventually gave rise to archosaurs and later dinosaurs.

Drawing Parallels

The same factors that have driven anthropogenic global warming today drove global ecological collapse at the end of the Permian. An over-abundance of greenhouse gasses made the planet unlivable for most living organisms. Actually, the warming that initiated the End-Permian may have occurred at a much slower rate than anthropogenic global warming.

“It was the same climate change caused by the same greenhouse gasses as what we’re seeing today,” Elkins-Tanton says. “And it was almost the end of multicellular life on earth.”

However, climate scientists project that, if we can lower our emissions quickly enough, we can keep global warming to levels far below the ones that scorched the earth during the earth’s largest extinction event. It’s not too late to avoid total and complete ecological collapse.

“The rate of change might not have been as fast as today, but it changed the temperature so much that it’s really the worst-case scenario of what might happen,” David Bottjer says, paleoecologist and University of Southern California professor of earth sciences. “That’s why we should study it. To understand future scenarios for our climate.”

The future scenario, most-analogous to the End-Permian, would see humans continue to burn fossil fuels until few surviving organisms remained. It’s a scenario that may not represent the end of life on earth, but a fundamental change that would take millions of years to rebound from.

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What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

While the Permian extinction was much earlier and not directly tied to mammoths, the pattern of rapid climate shifts shows how whole ecosystems can be destabilized, threatening species that cannot adapt fast enough.

Title:

Content: 44 mins ago - Science

Earth's sixth mass extinction is underway and "rapidly accelerating," study warns

Earth's sixth mass extinction is already happening — and it is rapidly accelerating, researchers warned in a study out this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) journal.

Why it matters: The study adds to a growing understanding of how humans have — often negatively — impacted Earth's trajectory.

What they found: The study noted that animal species are going extinct at rates 35 times faster than the historical norm over the past million years.

  • Researchers highlighted the role of humans in the phenomenon, noting that animal species lost in the past 500 years would have taken about 18,000 to go extinct in the absence of humans.
  • Habitat destruction, illegal trade and climate disruption will likely continue to drive extinction rate acceleration in the coming decades, the study added.

The mass loss of animal species means losing a record of the planet's evolutionary history and potential, and will have ramifications for humans, Gerardo Ceballos, the study's lead author, told Axios.

  • "There is life on the planet because of the plants and animals — wild plants and animals — and the ecosystems that they form," Ceballos said.
  • The crops humans use, the combination of gases of the atmosphere that make it suitable for life on Earth, and active compounds used for medications, are all in some ways dependent on plants and animals, he added.
  • By losing entire branches of genera, "we're losing the capability of the planet to maintain life in general, and to maintain human life in particular," Ceballos said.

State of play: The new research builds on a number of studies from past years that warned Earth is experiencing a sixth mass extinction.

  • Scientists have previously warned that up to 1 million species are threatened with extinction and some could be lost within decades.
  • A separate study published earlier this summer in the journal Biological Reviews noted that the sixth mass extinction, currently underway, is the first mass extinction "directly induced by a single species – humans."
  • Researchers in June proposed the demarcation of a new epoch to reflect humans' impact on Earth.

Yes but: Not all scientists are convinced that the current wildlife loss constitutes a sixth mass extinction.

  • "We have no idea how to identify a sixth mass extinction," Stuart Pimm, the Doris Duke Professor of Conservation Ecology at Duke University, told Axios.
  • Disagreeing with the premise of a sixth extinction doesn't mean disputing the fact that the Earth is experiencing wildlife loss that's much faster than in the last few million years, he stressed.
  • "When you start saying, 'Well, how does this compare to what happened 65 million years ago?' That's when it gets really difficult," Pimm said.

Ceballos defined mass extinction as a catastrophic event that happens relatively quickly, is caused by a natural catastrophe, and wipes out 70% of the plants and animals on Earth.

  • The debate over whether a sixth mass extinction is occurring "doesn't really matter," Ceballos said.
  • Regardless of what you call it, Earth is facing massive biodiversity loss, climate change, and the toxification of the environment, he added.

Background: The last mass extinction occurred after an asteroid struck the earth roughly 66 million years ago.

The bottom line: The new study notes that "immediate political, economic, and social efforts of an unprecedented scale" are necessary in order to prevent these mass extinctions and their impacts.

  • Humans have the science, technology, and knowledge "to do much better," Ceballos said.
Go deeper

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

**Mass Extinctions Context:**
Current research warns that Earth is undergoing a ‘sixth mass extinction’, where species disappear far faster than at natural background rates.

This rapid decline, seen both in historic events and today, often correlates with significant environmental disturbances—climate change being key among them.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Mass extinctions are catastrophic and fast, eradicating a large portion of plant and animal life.

While the end-Pleistocene event (which saw mammoths disappear) was not a mass extinction at this scale, it fits the pattern of quick, widespread loss driven by environmental upheaval.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

**Role of Humans:**
Early humans arrived in mammoth territories toward the end of the mammoth’s range.

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During the last ice age, woolly mammoths were among the largest creatures to walk the North American landscape. Now, a team of American and Canadian researchers has discovered that the elephantine beasts took the “walking” part of their job description quite seriously.

Based on an analysis of a single tusk from an adult male woolly mammoth found in Alaska, the scientists determined that the animal journeyed about 70,000 kilometres over the course of its life – a trip equivalent to nearly twice around the world.

“The range is staggering. ... He definitely moved across a huge, huge area,” said Clement Bataille, an assistant professor of earth and environmental science at the University of Ottawa and a co-author on the study.

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Dr. Bataille said the high degree of mobility may have been part of the mammoth’s mating strategy. In comparison, African elephants can travel a lot, too, he added, and males typically depart from the groups they are born into once they reach sexual maturity.

However, Dr. Bataille and his colleagues note that the requirement for such a large range to roam in may have ultimately hastened the extinction of the species once the climate warmed and the shaggy grazers were hemmed in by shifting vegetation patterns. That, in turn, would have left them more vulnerable to predators, including human hunters.

The study began in 2018 when Matthew Wooller, director of the Stable Isotope Facility at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, invited Dr. Bataille and other colleagues to join an effort to extract information from a mammoth fossil discovered in 2010 on the north side of the Brooks mountain range, a few hundred kilometres from the Arctic Ocean. The fossil dates back 17,000 years, to a time when much of Alaska was a glacier-free grass plain connected to Siberia by the Bering land bridge.

The researchers nicknamed their specimen “Kik,” after a river system near the place where it was found.

Using the mammoth’s sliced-open tusk, they obtained detailed measurements of oxygen and strontium isotopes that were locked in the ivory material. The mammoth acquired the isotopes, which vary according to local geology, through the vegetation and water it consumed over the course of its life. As the tusks grew at the rate of about five to six centimetres each year, they recorded changes in isotope levels, which reveal when and how often the animal moved between locations with different geology.

The team also tested isotope levels in rodents that were gathered in different parts of Alaska as part of museum collections. That allowed them to match their mammoth isotope measurements to geographic locations. Finally, they used artificial intelligence software to reconstruct possible paths the mammoth may have taken, working backward from the location where it died at the age of 28.

The results suggest that Kik began its life in the Yukon River basin of central Alaska. As a juvenile it moved regularly in a north-south pattern, during a time when it was likely part of a herd, the researchers said. At about age 16 its movements transitioned to longer distance travel, often centred on certain core areas where it stayed for periods of time before setting out for new pastures.

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“It just takes off and goes on these 500- to 600-kilometre trips all at one time, going from one core area to the next,” Dr. Bataille said. The study found that some of the places where the mammoth lingered are frequented today by migrating herds of caribou.

Jeffrey Rasic, a study co-author and archaeologist with the U.S. National Parks Service based in Fairbanks, said the data suggest that Kik followed a predictable sequence of movements. If that was typical for Alaskan mammoths, it would have provided a huge incentive for hunters moving into the area from Asia to situate themselves in places where they could reliably expect to meet their quarry at certain times of the year, rather than pursuing them over a vast landscape.

“That would be an ideal set-up for intercepting a really big ticket meal item like a mammoth,” he said.

Vincent Lynch, an evolutionary biologist at the University at Buffalo who was not involved in the study, said that while it’s not surprising to find animals moving over great distances, it’s quite a different matter to show that it happened in a species that no longer exists.

“That’s the trick that makes this study interesting,” he said. “It helps us better reconstruct the behaviour and ecology of mammoths in a way that’s really remarkable for an extinct species.”

Dr. Lynch, who has studied the genetics of the last known population of woolly mammoths, which died out about 4,000 years ago, said it’s an open question whether large-scale movement was a disadvantage.

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“We tend to think that widely distributed species which are mobile ... might be better able to find new habitats should the environment change. But could mammoths find refuge in a world that was warming?” he said.

One obvious limitation of the study is that its conclusions depend entirely on the movements of a single individual. Dr. Bataille said that he and his colleagues plan to perform a similar analysis on a female mammoth specimen for comparison.

The team’s study was published Thursday in the journal Science.

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What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

Archaeological evidence—including stone tools and kill sites—suggests humans hunted mammoths for meat, bones, and hides.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

The large size and herd behavior of mammoths may have made them attractive targets for human groups, especially as their numbers dwindled and their habitats shrank.

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

Increasing evidence points to humans playing a significant role in pushing small, fragmented populations to extinction, particularly on isolated refuges like Wrangel Island, where mammoths persisted thousands of years after vanishing from the mainland.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

Where were the last areas of wooly mammoth habitat?

islands in the Arctic Ocean near Siberia and Alaska

**Interactions and Lessons:**
The extinction of the mammoth was not due to a single cause but the interplay of rapid environmental change and human activities.

According to most recent research, what cause of wooly mammoth extinction is not as important as previously believed?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

As habitats changed and populations shrank, mammoths had little time to adapt or recover.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Human hunting pressure further hastened their demise, demonstrating how even early cultures could deeply affect megafauna and ecosystems.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

**Takeaway:**
Mammoth extinction shows that large animals are particularly vulnerable to simultaneous shifts in climate and human activity.

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Studying their disappearance helps us understand the cascading effects of environmental change and human impact, providing insights relevant to current biodiversity loss and conservation efforts.

**Summary: Extinction of the Woolly Mammoth—Environmental Factors & Human Impact**

The woolly mammoth's extinction has been widely debated, centering on two main factors: climate/environmental changes and human activities.

Title:

Content: Partners news
The cause of the extinction of mammoths
Scientists have found that mammoths died out due to climate change
Photo: Stanislav Krasilnikov / TASS
An international team of researchers found that the cause of the extinction of mammoths in Siberia was primarily a sharp climate change, not human activity.
The article is published in the journal Nature.
Woolly mammoths became extinct only about four thousand years ago.
They were not only the main source of meat of ancient people – the latter made from their bones the basis for dwellings, from their tusks made harpoons and even musical instruments.
Therefore, there is a widespread theory that the main cause of extinction was humans.
Researchers from the Institute of Earth Sciences of St. Petersburg State University together with colleagues from the UK, Denmark, China, Norway and the United States decided to restore the appearance of the tundrosteppe, which was inhabited by mammoths.
To do this, they using the shotgun method — obtaining from a random massive sample of cloned fragments of the original sequence — analyzed the DNA of ancient plants and animals collected from 535 different places in the Arctic, where the mammoth lived, over 20 years.
They also analyzed the DNA of more than 1,500 modern plants and animals.
Researchers were able to map the distribution of populations of mammoths and other representatives of the megafauna of the tundrosteppe.
They saw that over time their populations and genetic diversity became smaller and smaller — making survival increasingly difficult.
With the end of the Pleistocene about 12 thousand years ago and the accompanying retreat of glaciers and the formation of rivers, lakes and marshes, vegetation has decreased in volume, and it has become insufficient to maintain the previous level of populations.
As the climate warms, trees and swamp plants have taken the place of former mammoth pastures.
“We have shown that climate change, in particular rainfall, has directly led to changes in vegetation.
According to our models, people did not have any influence on them [mammoths], ” said the first author of the work, a researcher at the University of Cambridge Yuchen Wang.
However, the extinction of mammoths was influenced not only by the warming of the climate itself.
“His speed was the last nail in the lid of the coffin – they (megafauna tundrosteppe – approx.
“Tape.ru ”) could not adapt quickly enough, when the landscape radically changed and food was not enough, ” said the head of the scientific group, Professor of Copenhagen and Cambridge universities Eske Willerslev.
Only what is important to you is in the “Tape of the Day ” in Telegram.
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According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Analysis, including DNA studies of over 1,500 modern plants and animals and computer models, shows a complex interplay between these causes.

**Climate Change as a Primary Driver:**
New genetic and environmental data indicate the woolly mammoth survived multiple ice ages, but the most recent climate shifts proved catastrophic.

Title:

Content: The Hittite kingdom destroyed the preparation for drought
Recently, a lot of works have appeared, the authors of which tell how climate changes in the direction of drier and colder led to catastrophic consequences for a particular human civilization.
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According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

A crucial factor was not just *climate change* itself, but the *speed* and magnitude of these changes.

Title:

Content: In one of the most common versions of the extinction of giant mamutes, it is claimed that this was caused by the hunting of ancient people.
Our ancestors literally ate most of the animals.
But recent studies say that this is not the case and people have become far from the main reason for the disappearance of mammoths.
Hunger caused by climate change is the real killer.
Searching for gold, but found mammoths: an incredible story with the Yukon
Drawing of a mammoth on the wall of the cave of Arcy-sur-Cure, France / Photo Wikipedia
The Hungry Death of Great Animals
It would seem that mammoths existed for millions of years and survived several ice ages.
That is, climate change did not affect them critically.
But as soon as they encountered humans, they began to die out.
Finally, we were able to prove that the problem was not only climate change, but also the speed of these changes.
This was the last nail in the coffin – the mammoths could not adapt quickly enough when the landscape changed dramatically and food became scarce.
- says the author of the study Eske Willerslev, a professor at the University of Cambridge and director of the Center for Geogenetics of the Lundbeck Foundation at the University of Copenhagen.
The team, led by Prof. Willerslev, sequenced the DNA of plant, animal, and their fossilized excrement, coprolites.
The selection of these samples lasted about 20 years and allowed us to fully understand why the majestic animals died out.
After the end of the last cooling, the glaciers began to melt.
The environment quickly became quite humid, leading to a chain change in flora.
Typical mamut habitats and pastures became increasingly swampy and vegetation changed accordingly.
As a result, there is simply no food left typical for animals.
From birth to death: scientists have fully investigated the life path of the mammoth
Giants did not have time to adapt to rapid changes, so the total number of mammoths was constantly declining.
Because of this, isolated and partially isolated animal populations arose, which already caused little genetic diversity.
It is clear that all this did not positively affect the chances of survival.
Scientists say climate change is critical.
When such changes destroyed mammoths and probably another megafauna.
Today, we live in a time when the average temperature on the planet is rising again, so we need to take this “harsh lesson ” seriously.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

As global temperatures fluctuated and habitats transitioned towards drier, colder, and less productive ecosystems, vegetation patterns shifted rapidly, leading to a scarcity of mammoths’ preferred food plants.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

shrank grassland
food sources disappearing
restricted habitat

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Their large bodies required substantial resources, and the new environments could not sustain them.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

food sources disappearing
restricted habitat

The research highlights that mammoths could not adapt quickly enough to these dramatic landscape and climate transformations.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Beyond just the mammoth, the decline of "megafauna" (large animals like mammoths, cave lions) had global consequences, reducing the transport of vital nutrients (phosphorus, calcium, magnesium) by as much as 90%.

Title:

Content: Cave lions in Europe and mammoths in the United States.
Scientists have told what the Earth would be without Homo sapiens
The researchers say that in general, the planet could be an exciting place, which would be inhabited by representatives of megafauna.
Scientists believe that without humans, the Earth would be a more wild and fertile place, in which giants such as ostrich moa birds with a height of 3.6 meters still lived.
They lived in New Zealand for millions of years, but disappeared 750 years after their land was invaded by man, writes LiveScience.
The vanished giant moas and eagles of Haast, whose wingspan was 2.6 meters or more, are a small example of how human activity has changed the planet.
The survival of such large animals is crucial in thinking about what the Earth would be like without humans, as such giants have a crucial influence on landscapes.
Senior lecturer in zoology at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, Seren Forby, says humans have played a crucial role in the extinction of many large mammals.
Forby led the study, published in the journal Diversity and Distributions.
It said that without humans, the Earth would resemble an ecoregion in East Africa, the Serengeti, teeming with life.
In such a scenario, extinct animals, along with elephants, rhinos and lions, would live throughout Europe.
For example, the African lions (Panthera leo) would still be replaced by cave lions (Panthera spelaea), a larger species that lived in Europe about 12,000 years ago.
At the same time, America would be home to larger relatives of elephants and bears, as well as unique species such as the glyptodon – car-sized armadillos and giant sloths.
“In a world without humans, there would be a lot more different species of large mammals, as well as a much more open habitat, ” says Forby.
Elephants or other species of large animals do not tolerate obstacles in their search for food.
In such cases, the territory acquires a less wooded appearance.
The world would be brighter
During the last Pleistocene Ice Age (2.6 million to 11,700 years ago), the Earth was rich in megafauna.
Much of it went extinct after the end of this ice age or millennia later.
A 2021 study from the journal Nature found that climate change had wiped out woolly mammoths as well as other Arctic megafauna, but humans also put additional pressure on these species by hunting them.
Christopher Doughty, an ecologist at the University of Northern Arizona, modeled how large animals, among other things, affected ecosystems by moving seeds and nutrients during eating and defecating.
The expert found that the movement of elements such as phosphorus, calcium and magnesium, which play a crucial role in life, decreased by almost 90% along with the disappearance of megafauna.
The researcher emphasizes that without human intervention, all the necessary elements would be evenly distributed throughout the landscape.
Thus, the soil would be more fertile and productive.
Agriculture and zoning make land less fertile compared to systems in the wild.
Such increased fertility means that the Earth would be much richer in crops and colors, the planet would definitely be brighter without humans.
Without humans, the climate would be different.
Human induced global warming is known to have raised the average temperature by 1 degree Celsius since the early 20th century.
Consequently, the weather on the planet would be cooler without humanity.
A 2016 study in the journal Nature found that current warming delayed the onset of the ice age by at least 100,000 years.
But this should not have happened for another 50,000 years, so it is unlikely that without humans there would be another ice age on Earth right now.
People are inevitable
Modern humans (Homo sapiens) were not always the only hominins on the planet.
The disappearance of Homo sapiens could open up new perspectives for Neanderthals.
There is no single answer to the question of why the Neanderthals died out about 40 thousand years ago.
There were probably several reasons for their disappearance, and Homo sapiens are the main suspects.
Professor Chris Stringer from the Natural History Museum in London believes that the competition between Neanderthals and humans was one of the reasons for the disappearance of the former.
“If Homo sapiens hadn ’ t come to Europe about 45,000 or 50,000 years ago, I think Neanderthals and their descendants would still have lived on Earth, ” Stringer says.
The expert notes that Neanderthals led a complex life in Europe, they faced climate change, were a small group with low genetic diversity.
“Neanderthals probably were already in distress when modern humans came to their lands, and this factor could be the last, ” the expert notes.
But humans could have influenced the survival of more than just Neanderthals.
At least there is another relative of Homo sapiens who shared land with humans and Neanderthals: the Denisovans.
This line is closer to Neanderthals than to modern humans in terms of genes and appearance.
Judging by a number of studies, people interbred with Denisovans, because modern people continue to find the DNA of Denisovans.
It is assumed that Denisovans had a wider range of habitat than Neanderthals.
They may also have more genetic diversity than Neanderthals.
"Perhaps the Denisovans were even better species for survival than the Neanderthals," Stringer said.
In general, Denisovans and Neanderthals could pave the way similar to H. sapiens, moving from hunting and gathering to the development of agriculture.
"There is no obvious reason why Neanderthals or Denisovans would not have evolved if they had the time to do so," he said.

This affected the entire ecosystem, demonstrating the wide-reaching fallout from a single species' extinction.

Title:

Content: The secret of a soft life.
Scientists have discovered the cause of the first mass extinction
CC BY-SA 2.0 / Amanderson2 / Jelly couple with friend PalauUnderwater inhabitants of Lake Jellyfish in Palau
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There have been five mass extinctions on Earth, with up to 95 percent of species disappearing.
American scientists have established that 550 million years ago, at the very beginning of the formation of multicellular life, another one happened - Ediacaran, and soft-bodied organisms were replaced by skeletal forms, writes the author of RIA Novosti Vladislav Strekopytov.
Ediacaran fauna
Anatomically, almost all modern life originated at the beginning of the Cambrian period — about 540 million years ago.
Paleontologists call this event the "Cambrian explosion" and consider it the most significant event in biological evolution.
For a long time it was generally thought that before this multicellular organisms did not exist on Earth - in more ancient rocks such fossils were not found.
Therefore, in the geochronological scale, a boundary was drawn between Proterozoic (from Greek - "the era of initial life") and Phanerozoic ("the era of apparent life") just for the Cambrian period.
But in 1957 in Charnwood forest in England discovered charnia — Precambrian fossil, multicellular algae or a branch of a plant.
This was followed by finds in Canada, Namibia, Australia and Russia - in layers belonging to the last stage of the Proterozoic - Ediacary, this is 635-541 million years ago.
Precambrian multicellular - soft-bodied, mainly attached to the ground, with a branching or tubular structure.
All of them lived in the sea, had no skeleton and were much simpler than the Cambrian.
According to paleontologists, this turned out to be a dead end branch of evolution.
The exception is cnidaria, which include jellyfish, anemones and individual soft corals.
Recently, scientists have proved that cnidarians appeared on Earth 560 million years ago.
And this is the only Ediacaran organism that has survived to this day.
The first mass
The fact that such a sharp disappearance of almost the entire Precambrian fauna is associated with mass extinction was assumed, but accurate information was not available.
American paleontologists from the University of California at Riverside and the Virginia Institute of Technology decided to fill this gap.
They collected a global database on Ediacaran biota and analysed it in the light of the paleoecological situation.
Most often Ediacaran fossils are found in three complexes of Precambrian rocks: Avalon on the island of Newfoundland in Canada with an age of 575-560 million years, the White Sea in Russia on the Kola Peninsula and in South Australia (560-550 million years) and Namsky in Namibia (550-539).
A special species diversity is Avalonian.
It is estimated that only about 20 percent of species have passed from the White Sea to the Nam Sea.
Such a decline in biodiversity is a real mass extinction, comparable in scale to what was then the Phanerozoic.
Interestingly, there are no significant environmental differences between the White Sea and Nama complexes - sedimentation occurred in the same paleoclimatic conditions and at approximately the same depths.
At the same time, the researchers note that by the end of the White Sea period, many animals had acquired strange morphological features.
In particular, the surface area of the body increased in relation to volume.
Normally, marine organisms use this strategy to increase cell contact with seawater to facilitate access to oxygen.
From this, they concluded that the most likely cause of the Ediacaran extinction is a drop in the oxygen content in the atmosphere and sea water.
What exactly this was related to is still unknown.
"It could be any combination of factors such as volcanic eruptions, tectonic plate movements, asteroid impacts, and so on," one of the paper's authors, Professor Scott Evans, was quoted by the Virginia Institute of Technology as saying in a press release.
Role of oxygen
At one time, scientists proved that the largest mass extinction in the history of the Earth - the Permian (252 million years ago, when up to 95 percent of marine animals disappeared) - was accompanied by ocean anoxia, that is, a sharp drop in oxygen levels in sea water.
And the trigger was extremely high volcanic activity at the end of the Permian period.
In a short geologically speaking period of time (about a million years), several million cubic kilometers of magma erupted from the Earth ’ s interior on the territory of present-day Siberia.
The climate became warmer, the ocean overheated.
In such conditions, marine organisms need more oxygen.
That's what I was missing.
In addition, the abundance of CO2 in the atmosphere led to the acidification of seawater, which also hit the biocommunity.
Not to mention, volcanic emissions are toxic in and of themselves.
Turning Moment
It is possible that a similar scenario was realized at the end of the Ediacaran period.
However, according to a specialist in the Ediacaran fauna, Professor of the Faculty of Biology of Moscow State University Andrei Zhuravlev, it is unlikely that the matter was only in oxygen.
“Indeed, about 550 million years ago, the diversity of the Ediacaran fauna declined dramatically, ” the scientist notes.
In the Nama layers of organisms an order of magnitude less than in the White Sea.
But I can ’ t say they ’ re flat.
Rather, the opposite: a lot of voluminous, bag-shaped forms.
As for oxygen, its level fluctuated throughout the Ediacaran, as well as the preceding cryogenic and subsequent Cambrian periods.
These jumps, of course, influenced fauna and its morphology, but were hardly global. "
Zhuravlev believes that the multicellular fauna of the Ediacaran and the first half of the Cambrian periods was still very "young" and extremely sensitive to external conditions.
Therefore, “extinctions ” — episodes of sharp reduction, and then expansion of species composition — occurred repeatedly.
But in general, the Ediacaran forms were gradually replaced by the Cambrian forms more familiar to us.
"The oldest Avalon fauna is the most representative," explains the professor. - These are the famous "burdock on the legs", which are painted on all the reconstructions of the Ediacaran Sea.
In the White Sea, crawling organisms already appear, feeding not only on what floats, but also on what lies at the bottom.
In the Nama fauna, the diversity of Ediacaran organisms is indeed less, but there are "Cambrian" skeletal forms.
No sharp rearrangements of the biocommunity, indicating a catastrophe, is not visible.
Everything was smooth enough. ”
In the end, it does not matter what to call what happened 550 million years ago, at the end of the Ediacaran period, a classic extinction or just a mass restructuring of the biosystem, the scientist notes.
In any case, this is undoubtedly an important moment in the history of the Earth, when the previously actively developing soft-bodied fauna gave way to skeletal organisms.
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**The Role of Humans:**
While the article presents research suggesting early human hunting alone may not have been the decisive factor (with some models claiming "people did not have any influence"), the timing of mammoth decline often overlaps with the spread of Homo sapiens and improved hunting tools.

According to most recent research, what cause of wooly mammoth extinction is not as important as previously believed?

The presence of early humans likely added additive pressures, for instance, by modifying landscapes (deforestation, grassland burning) and competing for resources, which, when combined with climate stress, critically jeopardized mammoth populations.

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

Evidence from other extinctions—such as the moa in New Zealand, which disappeared rapidly after human settlement—supports the idea that arrival of humans can accelerate extinction processes, even when climate conditions are also changing.

**What This Tells Us:**
The extinction of the mammoth offers broader lessons about prehistoric extinctions.

It demonstrates how rapid environmental changes—whether natural or humans-induced—can exceed the adaptability of even long-surviving species.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Moreover, the cumulative impact of both climate change and human activity often proves more fatal than either factor alone.

Title:

Content: Science 2021-11-11T12: 03: 35 + 02: 00
Ukrainian News
Giant armadillos and mammoths.
Scientists have told what the Earth would look like if there were no people on it.
Giant armadillos and mammoths.
Scientists have told what the Earth would look like if there were no people on it.
This is what a glyptodon might look like, an armadillo-like creature that went extinct during the Ice Age.
Photo by Stocktrek Images
Man has greatly changed the landscape of planet Earth since the time of the development of tools.
And the more active the progress, the faster a person changes the face of the world around.
But if there were no humans on the planet, then there would be giant animals that are now extinct.
This conclusion was made by scientists, writes the publication Live science.
The land would belong to giant plants and animals.
Along with megafauna, Neanderthals, the distant ancestors of man, would also live.
Animals would be bigger.
For example, moa birds, similar to ostriches, would still live in New Zealand.
After humans came to the islands, the birds became extinct in 200 years.
According to Seren Faurbi of the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, for thousands of years, humans have played a crucial role in the extinction of many giant animals.
Without us, today ’ s Earth would in many ways resemble an African ecosystem teeming with life.
Thus, the animal world of Europe would resemble Africa with its elephants, lions and rhinos.
But instead of African lions, cave lions would live - they are larger.
And in Africa, there would be giant bears and animals similar to armadillos, but the size of a car.
Scientists are still arguing about what led to the extinction of mammoths.
This could be both climate change and human activity.
Christopher Doughty of the University of Northern Arizona studied how representatives of megafauna contributed to the distribution of seeds.
He believes that with the extinction of large animals, the redistribution of elements such as phosphorus, calcium and magnesium decreased by 90%.
Without humans, these elements would have been more evenly distributed, he said, leading to a more productive system.
Without humans, the climate would be different.
But what exactly – scientists can not say exactly.
As reported by Ukrainian News, in Tanzania found the bones of a previously unknown species of titanosaur with a unique coccyx in the shape of a heart.
The deposits in which the bones were found are dated to 100-110 million years old.
On the British Isle of Wight, archaeologists have found two new species of dinosaurs that were predators of large size.
In size, the fossil lizards were no less than a bus and hunted both on land and in water.
They had crocodile-like snouts, sharp teeth, and a whip-like tail.
In addition, scientists have discovered a small crab that was stuck in wood tar 100 million years ago, so perfectly preserved.
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Thus, the mammoth’s demise emphasizes the profound impact humans can have on ecosystems, both past and present, and provides a cautionary case for the vulnerabilities of today’s large mammals amidst ongoing global change.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

**Summary of Causes of Woolly Mammoth Extinction: Environmental Change and Human Impact**

During the last ice age (2.6 million to 11,700 years ago), the Earth supported many large animal species—or "megafauna"—including the woolly mammoth.

Title:

Content: How would the earth be different if modern man did not exist?
The Libyan Observatory Newspaper
LATEST NEWS
The human footprint can be seen across the planet today, from the towering skyscrapers that define our modern capitals to the pyramids and other ancient relics from our past.
Human activity also represents the sprawling open fields of agriculture, the roads that connect everything together.
But what would the world look like if humans didn ’ t exist before?
Some scientists paint a picture of a pure wilderness and an abundance of species, from fashionable to uncommon.
Trevor Worthy, a paleontologist and assistant professor at Flinders University in Australia, told Live Science: “I think it would be a much more vegetative place with a wealth of animals, of great size, spread across all continents except Antarctica. ”
A world without modern humans may also mean that our extinct human relatives, such as Neanderthals, will still exist.
And, of course, they would have changed the scene as well.
Humans shaped the world at the expense of many species, from the dodo (Raphus cucullatus) to the Tasmanian tiger (Thylacinus cynocephalus), which pushed us to extinction through activities such as hunting and habitat destruction.
The rate of extinction on Earth today is more than 100 times what it would have been without humans, according to the most conservative estimates, and has not been higher since the Cretaceous and Paleogene (K-Pg) extinction event that wiped out about 80% of animal species, including non-floating dinosaurs, 66 million years ago.
In other words, humans collided with the planet like an asteroid, and the dust continues to settle as wildlife continues to deteriorate.
“My great-grandfather was able to see herds of thousands of parrots in the landscape, my grandfather saw a hundred flocks, my father saw little and I ’ m lucky if I could see two in the woods, ” said Worthy.
The human-driven decline of nature suggests that Earth would be a more wild place without us, with some lost giants, such as moas, standing out the most.
This group of ostrich-like birds, some of which extend up to 11.8 feet (3.6 m) in New Zealand, evolved over millions of years.
Within 200 years of humans reaching their land 750 years ago, all nine species of moa have disappeared, along with at least 25 other vertebrate species, including the giant Haast eagles (Hieraaetus moorei) that hunted moa, according to Worthy.
The giant moa and the Haast vultures are recent examples of large animals whose eventual extinction is linked to human activities, such as unsustainable hunting and the introduction of invasive species into new habitats.
They are also indicators of what our relationship with large animals might be like elsewhere.
The survival of large animals is crucial to speculate on the existence of a land without humans, as these monsters have a significant impact on the landscape.
– Serengeti System
Soren Furby, senior lecturer in zoology at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, believes that humans played a key role in the disappearance of many large mammals thousands of years ago.
He led a 2015 study, published in the journal Diversity and Distributions, which suggested that without humans, the Earth would be much like the contemporary Serengeti system, an African ecosystem teeming with life.
In this scenario, extinct animals similar to those found in Serengeti today – including elephants, rhinos and lions – would live across Europe.
For example, instead of African lions (Panthera leo), there are still cave lions (Panthera spelaea), a slightly larger species that lived in Europe until about 12,000 years ago.
Meanwhile, the Americas will be home to relatives of huge elephants and bears, along with unique species, according to Forby.
"In a world without humans, there will be much more diversity than large mammals, and if you see a greater diversity than large mammals, you tend to see a more open habitat," Forby said.
Elephants and other large animals are well identified when finding food, and will not tolerate unnecessary obstacles.
“If you ’ re old enough, it might be easier to knock on a tree and eat fresh leaves on top of it, ” Forby said.
But also, if there are a large number of large mammals, there is a tendency to have fewer wooded plants in the first place, he said.
Large animals, such as elephants, are known as megafauna.
During the last ice age (2.6 million to 11,700 years ago), the world was rich in megafauna, but most of them died at the end of the ice age, or in the thousands of years since.
For example, about 38 genera of large animals went extinct in North America at the end of the last ice age, according to a 2020 study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Over the past century, scientists have debated whether natural climate changes or human activities, such as overfishing, are the main reason for the decline of these large animals.
A 2021 study published in Nature concluded that climate change ultimately wiped out the woolly mammoths (Mammuthus primigenius) and other Arctic megafauna that survived the end of the ice age.
However, humans hunted mammoths.
Scientists who believe humans may have been the main factor in their extinction, such as Forby, argue that mammoths survived climate change before humans appeared and would probably survive to this day had it not been for the added pressure humans placed on them.
Christopher Dottie, an associate professor and ecologist at Northern Arizona University, is modeling how past and present large animals transport seeds and nutrients through eating and defecating.
His work indicates that the transport of elements such as phosphorus, calcium and magnesium, which are important for life, was reduced by more than 90% through the extinction of large animals.
Dotti hypothesizes that without humans, elements would be evenly distributed across the landscape.
This means more fertile soil, which makes ecosystems more productive.
Humans tend to group elements together through practices such as farming and creating fenced areas, so that these areas become less fertile over time compared to terrestrial systems, according to Dauty.
Greater fertility means that plants can devote their resources to more fruit and flowers, so that the world looks more vibrant and feeds more animals.
While it is difficult to determine how humans and megafauna have influenced climate change for thousands of years with evidence obscured over time, it is much easier to judge our impact on Earth ’ s climate today.
Through global warming, caused by activities such as burning fossil fuels, humans have raised the global average temperature by about 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit (1 degrees Celsius) since the beginning of the 20th century.
Therefore, the Earth would have been at least colder without us.
A 2016 study published in the journal Nature concluded that human-induced warming would delay the next ice age by at least 100,000 years.
And it wasn't due for another 50,000 years, though, even without human delay, so it's unlikely that Earth would be in the middle of another ice age today if we didn't exist.
Humans are inevitable.
Scientists aren ’ t sure why Neanderthals went extinct about 40,000 years ago, but because they mate with Homo sapiens, parts of their DNA are found in some of us.
There were probably multiple causes of Neanderthal death, but we're a prime suspect.
Chris Stringer, a professor and research leader in human origins at the Natural History Museum in London, believes competition for resources was a factor in the disappearance of Neanderthals.
“If we weren ’ t around, if we hadn ’ t come to Europe 45,000 or 50,000 years ago, I think they ’ d probably stay here, ” he told Live Science.
According to Stringer, Neanderthals lived a complex life in Europe, similar to modern humans, but they had difficulty adapting to climate change and were relatively few in number, with low genetic diversity.
This is bad news for any species, as it is a sign of inbreeding and ill health.
Stringer said Neanderthals were probably “already in trouble, and when modern humans got there too, I think that ’ s probably what pushed them to the edge. ”
Scientists are still learning about at least one human lineage that lived around the same time as modern humans and Neanderthals: Denisovans.
This lineage appears to be closer to Neanderthals than modern humans in genes and appearance, but it can be distinguished from Neanderthals with very large molars.
There is evidence of DNA in current humans living in places like New Guinea in Oceania — a finding that suggests Denisovans were in Southeast Asia interacting with ancestors of modern humans who later settled in the East, according to a 2012 study published in the journal Science.
These Denisovan interactions, along with fossil evidence, suggest that they had a larger geographic range than Neanderthals, encompassing a variety of environments and, therefore, arguably, were more adaptive than Neanderthals.
DNA evidence also suggests that Denisovans may have had greater genetic diversity than Neanderthals, according to Stringer.
Stringer said: “There ’ s no reason why Neanderthals or Denisovans shouldn ’ t do it eventually, given enough time. ”
He added that they may have overcome any potential intellectual deficiency, which is not clear to them, through evolution.
So maybe the world won ’ t look completely different after all.
Likewise, they could have made the same mistakes we have made since then.
So, global warming could have been here, but with Neanderthals or Denisovans leading it, not us.
"Who knows?"
Source: Live Science

When did the wooly mammoth mostly become extinct?

However, by the end of the ice age and in the thousands of years that followed, most of these giant animals disappeared.

When did the last population of wooly mammoth become extinct?

from 300,000 years ago up until 10,000 years ago

When did the wooly mammoth mostly become extinct?

The extinction of the woolly mammoth is a classic example of megafaunal loss, and its causes illustrate the interplay between environmental changes and human activities.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

**Environmental Factors:**
- **Climate Change:** The transition from the last ice age to the current, warmer Holocene epoch led to significant changes in climate.

Title:

Content: Scientists warn of what could lead to a “mass extinction ” of marine life that“ rivals ” the severity of the Great Death!
The Libyan Observatory Newspaper
A new study has revealed that greenhouse gas emissions could lead to mass extinctions of marine life to levels not seen since before the dinosaurs.
Researchers in New Jersey modeled the future extinction risk of marine life in all of the world's oceans under different projected climate scenarios.
If emissions are not curbed, the loss of marine species due to global warming and oxygen depletion could reverse the “Great Death, ” the most serious extinction event on Earth, by about 2100, they say.
The Great Death, known as the deadliest extinction on Earth, saw the loss of 95% of all marine species when it occurred about 250 million years ago.
It can also match other major extinction events in Earth's history, including the mass extinction at the end of the Cretaceous that killed the dinosaurs 66 million years ago.
According to the researchers, tropical waters will face the greatest loss of biodiversity, while polar species are more at risk of extinction.
On a more positive note, experts say reversing greenhouse gas emissions could reduce the risk of extinction by more than 70 percent.
Lead author Justin Penn, at Princeton University ’ s Department of Earth Sciences, said: “The bright side is that the future is not written in stone.
The scale of the extinction we have discovered depends heavily on the amount of carbon dioxide [CO2] we release going forward.
“There is still enough time to reverse the trajectory of CO2 emissions and prevent the magnitude of warming that could cause this mass extinction. ”
The Great Death marks a period when life on Earth has never been so close to extinction without recovery, either before or after.
When carbon dioxide dissolves in the oceans, it becomes extremely acidic and the level of oxygen in the water drops, killing marine life.
Scientists have long debated theories of the cause of extinction ranging from meteorite impact to volcanoes, which could have caused climatic and environmental changes that make the Earth uninhabitable.
But in the event of the next mass extinction, history will directly blame anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions.
For the study, Ben and co-author Curtis Deutsch, also based at Princeton, combined existing data on marine species with climate change models to predict how changes in habitat conditions will affect their survival.
The experts compared their model to the size of the “Big Five, ” five historical mass extinctions recorded in the fossil record, among them the“ Great Death. ”
The researchers say that with global temperatures rising “as usual, ” marine life is likely to be subjected to a mass extinction that could potentially rival the size and severity of the Great Death.
Since the Great Death is the deadliest extinction event on Earth, the next marine extinction is likely to surpass the other four species.
Among the events, they found a common pattern – as the ocean warms and oxygen availability decreases, there is a clear decline in the abundance of marine life.
Water temperature and oxygen availability are key factors that will change as the climate warms due to human activity.
Warm water is not only a risk factor for species adapted to cold climates; it also contains less oxygen than cold water, slowing ocean circulation further and reducing the supply of oxygen at depth.
Paradoxically, the metabolic rates of the species increase as the water warms, and therefore the demand for oxygen rises as the supply decreases.
“Once the oxygen supply is less than what a species needs, we expect to see significant species losses, ” he said.
Experts say marine animals have physiological mechanisms that allow them to adapt to environmental changes, but only to a certain extent.
The researchers found that polar species are more likely to become extinct globally if climate warming occurs because they will not have suitable habitats to move to.
Tropical marine species are likely to be better off because they have traits that allow them to cope with warm, low-oxygen waters in the tropics.
To determine the relative importance of climate in the occurrence of extinctions, the team also compared future extinction risks from climate warming with data from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) on current threats to various marine animals.
They found that climate change currently affects 45% of marine species at risk of extinction, but is only the fifth most important stressor after overfishing, transport, urban development and pollution.
However, Ben said climate change could soon overcome all these stressors in importance.
"Extreme warming will lead to climate-induced extinctions, which, towards the end of the century, will compete with all current human pressures combined," he said.
The study, “Avoiding mass extinction of oceans due to climate warming, ” was published in the journal Science.
Source: Daily Mail

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

As temperatures rose, habitats suitable for cold-adapted animals like the mammoth shrank dramatically.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Warming led to the retreat of steppe-tundra mosaics—open, grassy plains that supported mammoth populations.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

- **Vegetation Shifts:** With fewer large herbivores present, and as the climate changed, forests expanded and grasslands contracted.

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Mammoths, dependent on open habitats with abundant grasses and sedges, struggled as their food sources declined.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

shrank grassland
food sources disappearing
restricted habitat

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

- **Water and Oxygen Stress:** Climate change often brought droughts and altered water availability, further stressing the megafauna.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

These changes also influenced species’ ability to adapt, especially in regions with limited ranges.

Title:

Content: Impacts of climate changeReuters
Climate change..
A real threat to biodiversity
Climate change is wreaking real devastation on the natural environment, leading to higher temperatures, melting ice, rising sea levels and changing rainfall patterns.
All animal and plant species are affected by climate change, but some species are particularly affected, with animals living in polar regions facing extinction due to melting ice.
In contrast, animals living in coastal areas are subject to extinction due to sea level rise.
Extinction of animals
Egyptian expert on climate affairs, Dr. Ahmed Abdel Aal, says that "rising temperatures lead to increased evaporation, and therefore a lack of water that directly affects the lives of marine organisms."
The impact on the lives of marine organisms does not stop, according to Dr. Abdel Aal to Eram News, but the repercussions of climate change extend to maritime traffic, which causes significant economic repercussions due to the decline of maritime traffic.
In a study published in the journal Science years ago, environmentalists noted that “climate change could push one-sixth of the world ’ s animal and plant species to extinction. ”
Organisms in South America, Australia and New Zealand are most at risk because many live in limited areas and cannot easily adapt to heat waves, droughts, floods or rising sea levels.
Experts agree that "climate change affects all aspects of life, including human health, food availability, economic growth, migration, food security, and social change, and also affects all other organisms, where it can lead to the extinction of some species."
An environmental disaster
For his part, explains Professor of Environmental Sciences at Ain Shams University, Dr. Wahid Imam, that "exceeding the temperature rise of 1.5 ° C is a disaster, because it will lead to desertification of agricultural lands, and increase droughts, which is a direct danger to human life and other living organisms."
Imam stressed, in a statement to "Eram News", that "the extinction of living organisms affects the environmental balance, which puts human life and the environment at risk," noting that "drought and desertification cause the degradation of agricultural lands, which increases the scarcity of food in the world."
Some conservationists worry that removing plants and animals from their ecological context would alter their evolutionary trajectory or even accelerate their extinction.
Animals play an important role in maintaining a healthy environment, and every species lost due to human intervention can bring us one step closer to irreparable environmental damage.
According to Live Science, the rate of animal extinction is accelerating, with one million species currently threatened with extinction, and the loss of these animals will have unprecedented and irreversible effects on the environment, and may lead to the loss of other species.
"Many organisms cannot survive, except at freezing latitudes or in corals that will dwindle under constant high temperatures."
Heat stress
Professor of Geology and Water Resources at Cairo University, Dr. Abbas Sharaki, pointed out that "the increase in evaporation intensity in water, causes many burdens for most countries of the world, where it leads to low water levels, which affects plants and animals, and causes the so-called thermal stress, which affects the productivity and growth of plants, and the ability of animals to grow."
Sharaki added, in statements to Eram News, that "the burning of fossil fuels, especially coal, is the main reason for the increase in the pace of climate change, as the burning of fossil fuels results in greenhouse gases that lead to higher temperatures, and increased climate variability."
The Secretary General of the Environmental Training Center in Sweden, Dr. Ezzat Hassan, explains that "the pollution of the seas and oceans affects the health and diversity of marine organisms, and causes changes in the forms of some organisms, making them unable to adapt to the new environment."
What's the solution?
On ways the world can avoid worsening the crisis, environmentalists agree that “reliance on renewable fuels is the best solution to climate change. ”
Dr. Ezzat Hassan explained, in statements to "Eram News", that "renewable fuel does not produce carbon emissions, which helps to reduce the temperature of the Earth."
“Fuel emissions lead to higher temperatures, melting ice, rising sea levels and changing rainfall patterns, causing the extinction of some species, changing genetic diversity and disrupting the food chain, ” he said.
The Ambassador of the European Climate Charter, Ambassador Mustafa Al-Sherbini, believes that “the immediate elimination of fossil fuels is impossible, because renewable energy sources are unable to meet the needs of many industries, especially heavy industries, such as iron and steel. ”
Although relying on green hydrogen is an important step in the fight against climate change, it still faces challenges, such as its high cost in Europe, Al-Sherbini told Erm News, who pointed out that "Arab countries have the advantage of the solar belt, which makes them more suitable for the production of hydrogen."
“Nuclear energy is a vital option to address climate change, as it can fill the deficit caused by reducing the use of fossil fuels, as well as it does not depend on external factors such as the weather, making it more stable than renewable energy sources, ” said Dr. Wahid Imam.
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How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

**Human Activities:**
- **Hunting Pressure:** The arrival of modern humans coincided with the decline of mammoth populations.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

Evidence suggests that humans hunted mammoths for meat, hides, and bones.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

Even low levels of sustained hunting could have driven slow-reproducing populations toward extinction.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

- **Fire and Landscape Modification:** After humans arrived, fire became a more regular part of many ecosystems.

Title:

Content: Scientists fear a repeat of an ancient fire that wiped out entire species
Science and Technology
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Over the past decade, deadly wildfires have become increasingly common due to human-induced climate change and disruptive land management practices.
Southern California experienced a wave of wildfires 13,000 years ago.
These fires have permanently changed vegetation in the region and contributed to the largest extinction on Earth in more than 60 million years.
A team of researchers has a unique perspective on the causes and long-term consequences of environmental changes, both those associated with natural climate variability and those caused by humans.
In a new study published in August 2023, researchers sought to understand the changes that occurred in California during the last major extinction event at the end of the ice age.
The event wiped out most of the large mammals on Earth about 10,000 to 50,000 years ago, as dramatic climatic disturbances spread.
Scientists often call the past 66 million years of Earth's history the Age of Mammals.
During that time, some organisms exploited the extinction of dinosaurs to become the dominant species on the planet.
During the Ice Age, Eurasia and the Americas were teeming with enormous beasts such as woolly mammoth, giant bears, and terrible wolves.
Two camels, three species of ground sloths and five species of big cats roamed what is now Los Angeles.
And then suddenly she went away.
Around the world, the large mammals that characterized global ecosystems have disappeared for tens of millions of years.
North America has lost more than 70% of mammals weighing more than 97 pounds (44 kg).
South America lost more than 80%, and Australia lost almost 90%.
Africa, Antarctica and a few remote islands hold what can be considered “normal ” animal communities today.
The cause of these extinctions remains unclear.
For decades, paleontologists and archaeologists have debated possible causes.
With the end of the last ice age, the warming of the climate changed weather patterns and reorganized plant communities.
At the same time, the population was growing rapidly and spreading all over the world.
Either or both of these processes could be involved in the extinction event.
But the fossil record of any region is usually so rare that it is not known exactly when large mammal species from different regions disappeared.
This makes it difficult to determine whether habitat loss, resource scarcity, natural disasters, human hunting, or a combination of these factors is the cause.
Some records provide evidence.
La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, the richest ice age fossil site in the world, preserves the bones of thousands of large mammals that have been trapped in sticky asphalt spills for the past 60,000 years.
The proteins in these bones can be accurately dated using radiocarbon, giving scientists unprecedented insight into the ancient ecosystem and a chance to shed light on when – and why – it collapsed.
A recent study of La Brea Tar Pits and nearby Lake Elsinore uncovered evidence of a tragic event 13,000 years ago that permanently altered southern California ’ s vegetation and caused the disappearance of La Brea ’ s famous mega-mammals.
Sediment archives from the bottom of the lake and archaeological records provide evidence of a deadly combination — a warm climate punctuated by decades of drought and a rapidly growing population.
These factors have pushed the Southern California ecosystem to a turning point.
The catalyst for this dramatic shift seems to have been the unprecedented increase in wildfires, possibly caused by humans.
The processes that led to this collapse are familiar today.
As California warmed up after emerging from the last ice age, the landscape became drier and forests receded.
In La Brea, herbivores have declined, possibly due to a combination of human hunting and habitat loss.
In the millennium before the extinction, average annual temperatures in the region rose by 5.5 degrees Celsius, and the lake began to evaporate.
Then, 13,200 years ago, the ecosystem went into a 200-year drought.
Half of the remaining trees were lost.
With fewer large herbivores eating them, dead plants accumulated on the landscape.
Humans and our ancestors have used fire for hundreds of thousands of years, but fire has different effects on different ecosystems.
Coal records from Lake Elsinore reveal that before humans, fire activity was low on the southern coast of California.
But from 13,200 to 13,000 years ago, as the population grew, fires in the region increased in order of magnitude.
The research suggests that the combination of heat, drought, loss of herbivores and human fires has pushed this system to a tipping point.
At the end of this period, Southern California was covered with plants that thrive after the fires.
A new fire system was created, and the huge animals disappeared.
Lessons for the future
Studying the causes and consequences of Pleistocene extinctions in California can provide a valuable context for understanding today ’ s climate and biodiversity crises.
A similar combination of climate warming and population expansion, biodiversity loss and human-ignited fires that marked the receding ice age in Southern California is once again emerging today.
The worrying difference is that temperatures today are rising 10 times faster than they were at the end of the ice age, mainly due to the burning of fossil fuels.
This human-caused climate change has contributed to a fivefold increase in the frequency, intensity and area burned in California in the past 45 years.
While California is now famous for severe fires, the study reveals that fire is a relatively new phenomenon in this region.
In the 20,000 years leading up to the extinction, the Lake Elsinore record showed a drastic reduction in the incidence of any fire even during similar droughts.
It is only after the arrival of man that fire becomes a regular part of the ecosystem.
Even today, collapsed power lines, campfires and other human activities have caused more than 90% of wildfires on the California coast.
The similarities between the massive extinctions of the Pleistocene and the current ecological crises are striking.
The past teaches us that the ecosystems we depend on are prone to collapse when subjected to multiple intersecting pressures.
Redoubling efforts to eliminate greenhouse gas emissions, prevent reckless fires and preserve the massive organisms remaining on Earth could help avoid another, more catastrophic transformation.
The report was prepared by Lisa N. Martinez, PhD candidate in Geography from the University of California, Los Angeles, and Regan E. Dunne, Assistant Professor of Earth Sciences from the School of Arts, Arts and Sciences at the University of Southern California, Duransev.
Source: Science Alert
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Human-set fires could alter habitats, promoting vegetation less favorable to mammoths and reducing their range.

Title:

Content: Saturday 12 November 1443 AH - 11 June 2022 |
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Extinction of these animals has increased grassland fires
Translated by Voice of Beirut International
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A study has identified that the loss of megafauna in grazing land 50,000 years ago has led to a dramatic increase in grassland fires worldwide.
These large herbivores, which included the iconic woolly mammoth, giant bison and ancient horses, are believed to have become extinct as the climate warms.
However, the experts who led the study from Yale University showed that their loss had conclusive effects, with herbs they no longer ingested to provide fuel for wildfires.
The team added that their findings highlight the need to consider the role of herbivores when predicting current and future global fire activity.
The research was conducted by ancient ecologist Alison Karp of Yale University, Connecticut, and her colleagues.
“These extinctions led to a series of consequences, ” Dr. Karp said, among them, she explained, the collapse of predators and the loss of fruit trees that relied on large herbivores to disperse their seeds.
“Studying these effects helps us understand how herbivores shape the global environment today. ”
The researchers wondered whether the loss of giant herbivores would likely lead to the accumulation of dry grass, leaves and wood, which would lead to an increase in fire activity.
In their study, experts compiled a large list of now lost mammals and approximate dates on which they became extinct across four continents.
Their analysis indicated that South America lost the largest grazing species (83 per cent of all species), followed by North America (68 per cent), Australia (44 per cent) and Africa (22 per cent).
The team then compared this data to records of past wildfire activity as recorded by the presence of coal in lake sediments from 410 locations around the world.
Not only did this reveal wildfire activity increase following the extinction of megafauna, but the Americas, which lost more grazing, saw greater increases in fire levels than in Australia and Africa, where changes were less.
According to Dr. Karp and her colleagues, pastures have changed around the world due to the loss of herbivores, the resulting fires and the loss of grasses eaten by grazing.
It took some time for new livestock breeders, including cattle, to adapt to new ecosystems.
However, the loss of large animal species, such as mastodons, giant sloths and Diprotodons in Australia, which all feed on shrubs and trees, has not been found to be associated with a similar increase in wildfires.
The team said the findings show how we should think about the role of wildlife and livestock herders in mitigating wildfires, especially given climate change.
Study author and ecologist Carla Staffer, also from Yale University, said: “This work really highlights how important grazing is in shaping fire activity. ”
"We need to pay close attention to these interactions if we are to accurately predict the future of fires."

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

- **Ecosystem Disruption:** The combination of hunting, land burning, and other human impacts pushed ecosystems toward "tipping points," causing cascading losses of species and habitats.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

**Wider Lessons & Modern Parallels:**
- Scientists debate whether natural climate changes or human activity—or a combination—drove most megafaunal extinctions.

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Current research increasingly supports the idea that both were important, and their effects compounded each other.

- The extinction of the mammoth and other Ice Age giants shows how sensitive large species are to rapid environmental changes and human impacts.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

This lesson is relevant today as modern species face climate-induced habitat loss, pollution, and overexploitation.

Title:

Content: General Supervision
Elham Aboul Fath
Editor-in-Chief
Thank you for your patience.
General Supervision
Elham Aboul Fath
Editor-in-Chief
Thank you for your patience.
The Sixth Mass Extinction.
A study that raises questions about the future of life on Earth.
A new study raises troubling concerns about the future of life on planet Earth, suggesting that we may already be in the midst of a sixth mass extinction.
Mass extinctions throughout history
Earth's history has seen five major mass extinctions, which wiped out a large proportion of living species.
These extinctions are thought to have been caused by catastrophic factors such as asteroid collisions and intense volcanic activity.
Evidence of the Sixth Extinction
The new study is based on an analysis of species extinction rates in the modern era, and the results suggest that current extinction rates are much higher than normal rates, and that we have already lost a large number of species.
Contributing factors
Scientists attribute the main cause of the sixth extinction to human activities, including:
Habitat destruction: Urban, agricultural and industrial expansion is destroying forests and other natural areas, threatening the survival of many species.
Climate change: Rising temperatures and changing weather patterns strain ecosystems and threaten the survival of species that cannot adapt.
Pollution: Pollution of various types poisons the environment and destroys habitats, affecting the health and survival of species.
Overfishing and illegal wildlife trade: The unsustainable exploitation of species causes their numbers to decline and threatens their survival.
Consequences
Scientists warn that the sixth extinction will have serious consequences for the environment and human health.
The loss of biodiversity affects the stability of ecosystems and threatens the services they provide to us, such as pollination and purification of water and air.
SOLUTIONS
Scientists stress the urgent need to take serious action to reduce biodiversity loss.
These procedures include:
Protection of natural habitats: establishment of natural reserves and expansion of protected areas.
Combating climate change: reducing greenhouse gas emissions and switching to renewable energy sources.
Reducing pollution: Applying strict laws to reduce various types of pollution.
Combating poaching and illegal wildlife trafficking: strengthening law enforcement and raising awareness of the importance of wildlife protection.
The Future of Life on Earth
The future of life on Earth depends on our ability to take decisive action to address the environmental challenges we face.
Scientists warn that failure to do so could lead to catastrophic consequences for our planet and civilization.

- Understanding the mammoth’s extinction helps us predict and potentially prevent future biodiversity crises, emphasizing the importance of habitat preservation, mitigating climate change, and managing human impacts on ecosystems.

Title:

Content: The sixth mass extinction on Earth begins.
Warning of "devastating" negative effects on humans
2023-09-24 | 04: 45
Alsumaria News - Miscellaneous
In a new study, researchers warn that the sixth mass extinction on Earth has already begun and is accelerating dramatically, noting that the rate of extinction among animals will be significantly higher than it has historically been, adding to similar studies that warned that the Earth is not in good shape.
The new study, published last week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, said the study is important because it sheds more light on how humans affect Earth's trajectory, usually negatively.
According to the study, animal species will be extinct at a rate 35 times faster than historically recognized during the past million years, and the researchers highlighted the role of humans in this phenomenon, noting that animal species that became extinct during the past 500 years would have taken about 18,000 years to extinction in the absence of humans.
But habitat destruction, illegal trade, and climate disruption will likely continue to accelerate the pace of extinction over the next decades.
Gerardo Ceballos, the lead author of the study, says that the mass loss of animal species means the loss of a record of the Earth's evolutionary potential and history, adding that "there is life on this planet thanks to plants and animals, including wild animals and plants, and the ecosystem that forms them."
Ceballos noted that the crops used by humans, the combination of atmospheric gases that make the Earth habitable, and the active compounds used in medicines all depend in one way or another on plants and animals, and that when we lose whole branches of species, “we lose the planet ’ s ability to sustain life in general, and save life in particular. ”
The new research builds on a number of studies that have warned of a mass extinction event in recent years, and scientists have previously warned that up to a million species are threatened with extinction, and that some of them could be lost within a few decades.
A separate study published in the journal Biological Reviews earlier this summer suggested that the current sixth mass extinction event was the first mass extinction “to occur as a direct result of the actions of one species: humans. ”
In June 2023, researchers proposed the start of a new era that reflects the impact of humans on the planet, but not all scientists are convinced that the current loss of wildlife represents a sixth mass extinction event.
Stuart Beam, a professor of conservation at Duke University, told MEE: "We have no idea how to determine the sixth mass extinction event," but he stressed that disagreeing with the sixth extinction hypothesis does not mean denying the fact that the Earth is experiencing loss of wildlife, at a faster pace than in the past millions of years.
While Ceballos says the debate about whether or not the sixth mass extinction will occur “doesn ’ t really matter, ” he said, adding that the Earth is already suffering from a significant loss of biodiversity, climate change, and environmental poisoning — regardless of the label.
It is noteworthy that the Earth has experienced 5 mass extinctions, namely:
The Ordovician Silurian Extinction – 444 million years ago
Late Devonian extinction – 383 to 359 million years ago
Permian – Triassic extinction – 252 million years ago
Extinction of the Jurassic Triassic – 201 million years ago
The Cretaceous and Paleogene Extinction – 66 million years ago
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What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

In summary, the woolly mammoth’s extinction resulted from a synergy between rapid climate change and the expanding influence of early humans, which together transformed the mammoth's ecosystem beyond its ability to adapt or survive.

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Here are the main nuggets of information derived from the extracts you provided, focusing on themes related to extinction, climate change, and human impact on past ecosystems, which can help illustrate broader patterns relevant to the woolly mammoth’s extinction:

- Environmental change, especially shifts in climate and sea level, have historically played a critical role in driving extinction events, as seen in the disappearance of marine animals in Antarctica millions of years ago.

Title:

Content: A recent study has revealed the mysterious disappearance of marine animals that occurred in Antarctica between 390 and 38.5 billion years ago.
The study provides new insights into the profound impacts of climate and sea level changes on marine ecosystems.
During the Early Middle Devonian period, Gondwana supercontinent was located near Antarctica, including parts of present-day Africa, South America and Antarctica.
Contrary to the icy landscape we now associate with Antarctica, this ancient land experienced a warmer climate and higher sea levels that led to widespread flooding.
Scientists have long been puzzled by the emergence and subsequent disappearance of the Malvinnox Hawthorne biota, a group of marine animals that thrive in colder waters.
This group consists of various types of shellfish, many of which are now extinct.
After two centuries of mystery, the study ’ s lead author, Dr Cameron Payne Clark, explains that the origin and disappearance of these animals has finally been unravelled.
To study this phenomenon, researchers collected and analyzed large amounts of fossil data.
By using advanced analytical methods, they scrutinized ancient rock formations, each containing its unique fossil record.
The analysis showed seven to eight different layers, indicating a gradual decline in marine animal diversity.
Comparing these layers with ancient environmental data and global temperature records, the researchers made a shocking discovery.
They found a strong correlation between the decline in marine species diversity and sea level fluctuations and climate change.
It was during the global cooling phase that the Malvinnox Hawthorne biota flourished.
Cooler conditions allowed these animals to specialize by benefiting from the circumpolar thermal barrier near the poles.
However, as temperatures began to rise, the Malvinnox Hawthorne animals disappeared, making way for species more suited to warmer waters.
Changes in sea level during this period may have broken the natural ocean barrier, allowing warm equatorial waters to penetrate the Antarctic.
As a result, these warm-water species dominate, marking the demise of Marvellous Knox Hawthorne marine life.
The collapse of the polar ecosystem caused by the disappearance of the Malvinnox Hawthorne biota is catastrophic and irreversible.
Dr Payne-Clark described it as a "murder mystery 39 billion years ago."
The results show that the combined effects of sea level and temperature change are the main factors that triggered this extinction event.
Although this particular event coincided with a known extinction event during the Early Middle Devonian period, the researchers lacked accurate age inference.
Understanding the sensitivity of polar environments and ecosystems to changes in sea level and temperature is critical, especially given the current biodiversity crisis.
The study highlights the permanence of the changes taking place in the polar regions.
These findings highlight the urgency of protecting and preserving these fragile ecosystems.
The source:
– Study lead author Dr. Cameron Penn-Clarke of the Institute of Evolutionary Studies at King Hill University.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Warming temperatures and rising seas allowed new species to invade and replaced cold-adapted ones, showing how ecological barriers can break down quickly with environmental disruption.

Title:

Content: A recent study revealed the mysterious disappearance of marine animals that occurred in Antarctica between 39 and 385 billion years ago.
The study provides new insights into the profound impacts of climate and sea level changes on marine ecosystems.
During the Early Middle Devonian period, the Gondwana supercontinent was located near the South Pole, including parts of present-day Africa, South America, and Antarctica.
Contrary to the icy landscape we now associate with Antarctica, this ancient land experienced a warmer climate and higher sea levels that led to massive flooding.
Scientists have long been puzzled by the emergence and subsequent disappearance of the Marvinox Hawthorne biota, a group of marine animals that thrive in colder waters.
This group consists of various types of shellfish, many of which are now extinct.
After two centuries of mystery, the study ’ s lead author, Dr. Cameron Payne Clark, explains that the origins and disappearance of these animals have finally been unraveled.
To study this phenomenon, researchers collected and analyzed large amounts of fossil data.
Using advanced analytical methods, they carefully examined ancient rock layers, each containing its unique fossil record.
The analysis showed seven to eight different layers, indicating a gradual decline in marine animal diversity.
After comparing these layers with ancient environmental data and global temperature records, the researchers made a shocking discovery.
They found a strong correlation between declining marine species diversity and sea-level fluctuations and climate change.
It was during the global cooling phase that the Malvinox Hawthorne biota flourished.
Cooler conditions allow these animals to benefit from the circumpolar heat barrier near the poles, allowing them to specialize.
However, as temperatures began to rise, the Marvinox Hawthorns disappeared, making way for species more suited to warmer waters.
Changes in sea level during this period may have broken the natural ocean barrier, allowing warm equatorial waters to seep into the South Pole.
As a result, these warm-water species dominate, marking the demise of marine life in Malvinox Hawthorne.
The collapse of polar ecosystems caused by the disappearance of the Malvinox Hawthorne biota is catastrophic and irreversible.
Dr. Payne Clark described it as "the mystery of murder 39 billion years ago."
The results show that the combined effects of sea level and temperature changes are the main factors that triggered this extinction event.
Although this particular event coincided with a known extinction event from the Early Middle Devonian period, the researchers lacked an accurate age inference.
Understanding the sensitivity of polar environments and ecosystems to changes in sea level and temperature is critical, especially given the current biodiversity crisis.
The study highlighted the permanence of changes occurring in polar regions.
These findings highlight the urgency of protecting and preserving these fragile ecosystems.
Source:
– Study lead author, Dr. Cameron Penn-Clarke, of the Institute of Evolutionary Studies at King ’ s University.

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

- These extinctions were not isolated: they are often part of complex, interconnected global changes including temperature shifts, ocean acidification, and habitat loss.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

- Ecosystem collapse does not require the disappearance of every species.

Title:

Content: UN report: Disasters everywhere are more interconnected than people think | Technology | DW | 12.09.2021
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Science and technology environment
UN report: Disasters everywhere are more interconnected than people think
Whether it is a climate crisis, an ecological crisis, a natural disaster, or a plague pandemic, the interconnectedness of these disasters is often beyond our imagination.
A recent report by the United Nations University attests to this view.
Locust infestation in Kenya
The cold snap of Texas, the locust disaster in East Africa, the extinction of the Yangtze River sturgeon -- this is an ancient fish from the Cretaceous period of the dinosaur era in China, known as the "living fossil in the Yangtze River", but because of the impact of human activities completely disappeared.
Despite the fact that borders and oceans are separated and that individual species or entire ecosystems and communities may be affected, the common denominator of disasters is beyond recognition and planning to date.
This is the key finding of a report published by the United Nations University on 8 September.
Scientists have confirmed that over the past two years, several of the most serious disasters have sprung up, interacting with each other and aggravating the situation, in many cases being fueled by the same human behaviour.
According to Zita Sebesvari, a senior scientist at the United Nations University and one of the lead authors of the report, “People often feel distant when they learn about disasters from news reports.
However, even disasters thousands of kilometres apart are often interrelated. "
As the planet warms and tropical cyclones become stronger, the COVID-19 pandemic adds to the devastation
Recurrent crises
According to the United Nations University report, the analysis shows that the root causes of most disasters are the following three: burning fossil fuels, poor risk management, and too little consideration of environmental factors in decision-making.
According to the report, a large number of disasters are related to extreme weather.
In Vietnam, nine different storms, heavy rainfall and floods occurred in just two months, causing severe damage nationwide.
A tropical cyclone caused by climate change made landfall in Bangladesh, forcing people to shelter in the new crown.
Jack O'Connor, another senior UNU scientist and another lead author of the report, said that disasters "interacted": if emergency shelters were used to protect people from extreme weather while sheltering coronavirus patients, fewer people could or wanted to use them because they were more vulnerable to the virus.
As soon as the hurricane hits, it will damage hospitals and disrupt the supply lines needed to treat patients.
He noted that the authorities had not taken the pandemic into account when considering the hurricane response, “but that ’ s something we have to start doing. ”
In July, floods hit Central Europe, and early evacuations could have saved many lives.
Extreme weather is becoming more frequent.
A week before the release of the UNU report, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) also published an analysis showing that climate-related disasters have occurred almost every day in the world over the past 50 years — from hurricanes to droughts, causing an average of 115 deaths and $202 million (170 million euros) in property damage every day.
However, mainly due to advances in forecasting and early warning systems, the number of deaths due to extreme weather has declined overall, despite the warming of the planet as a result of human burning of fossil fuels.
Improved forecasting and early warning systems have made it possible for Governments to evacuate people safely in advance of extreme weather events, reducing the death toll from devastating storms and floods.
At the same time, however, the number of displaced persons increased.
It is unclear whether this tie-up will continue as the planet warms and more disasters pile up.
According to a landmark report released in August by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), human impacts may have increased the incidence of “complex extreme events ” since the 1950s.
For example, heatwaves and droughts are occurring more frequently and simultaneously throughout the world; in some areas, there is a similar trend in heavy rain and storms or fires.
According to the IPCC, if the Earth were 4 degrees Celsius warmer than the pre-industrial average, the frequency of heatwaves in the past 50 years would increase by 38 times.
The Earth is currently warming by 1.1 degrees Celsius.
Despite the commitment of world leaders to limit warming to an ideal 1.5 degrees Celsius by the end of the century, their current policies are likely to double that.
The ecological crisis and the climate crisis
The UNU report highlights three examples of ecological hazards closely related to climate change as illustrative.
As of last year, about 25 percent of Australia's Great Barrier Reef has been severely bleached.
If global warming is 1.5 degrees Celsius, coral reefs will be reduced by 70 to 90 percent; if global warming is 2 degrees Celsius, all the world's coral reefs will disappear.
However, Professor O ’ Connor said that while climate change was a major factor, the loss of coral reefs could also be linked to factors such as pollution and overfishing.
He trained as a marine scientist and surveyed coral reefs in situ before and after bleaching.
"It used to be like 'Undersea Mobilization'... full of color and life," O'Connor said, referring to the famous Pixar cartoon depicting fish, and now, "you see a coral reef bleached by rising ocean temperatures."
All the colors are gone and everything is white.
Not only that, but it's like a graveyard: all the animals have moved away. "
In the Amazon rainforest, large swathes of forest have been burned to meet the global demand for meat, to be levelled out for livestock, or to grow soybeans for fodder.
As a result, carbon uptake in forests and polluting the atmosphere is reduced.
According to some studies, deforestation and global warming will accelerate the rate of forest death until the tipping point, from where the Amazon will become dry savannah.
Epidemic lockdown increases difficulty for firefighters fighting fires in Amazon rainforest
In China, the Yangtze River sturgeon became extinct last year after decades of overfishing, pollution and the construction of several dams that cut off its life in the upstream spawning grounds.
As with coral reefs, the loss of a species can lead to the collapse of an entire ecosystem.
How to balance
Based on its findings, the report highlights how policymakers can fake a number of “win-win solutions ”, such as reducing emissions or designing more natural infrastructure to prevent disasters.
The authors point out that in the Amazon and the Yangtze, people forcibly change their natural features in order to use economic resources, often without regard to environmental costs.
The report also points to the costs of ignoring the links between disasters and implementing wishful thinking solutions that make other extremes worse: for example, dams that generate clean electricity and provide alternatives to fossil fuels have led to the demise of the Chinese paddlefish.
In some cases, the trade-offs may outweigh the gains and losses; in some cases, targeted policies may offset the losses.
"We can't have any more short-sighted behaviours that end up hurting us... we have to do better," O'Connor said.
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