Contrary to our conclusions, Ravelo et al. argue that our TEX86-based sea surface temperature (SST) records do not conflict with the supposition of "permanent El Niño-like" conditions during the early Pliocene. We show that the way Ravelo et al. treat the existing temperature data perpetuates an inaccurate impression of cooler Pacific warm-pool SSTs and low equatorial temperature gradients in t...

Concentrations of cosmogenic Al and Be in cave sediments and bedrock surfaces, combined with studies of landscape morphology, elucidate the topographic history of the southern Sierra Nevada over the past 5 Ma. Caves dated by Al/Be in buried sediments reveal that river incision rates were moderate to slow between c. 5 and 3 Ma (≤0·07 mm a), accelerated between 3 and 1·5 Ma (c. 0·3 mm a−), and th...

—Most studies of extinction selectivity have focused on mass extinctions. Here we analyze the patterns of susceptibility to extinction during the late Pliocene and Pleistocene of California in the family Pectinidae. The Pectinidae declined in diversity from a high of 32 species in the late Pliocene to the current level of 11 species living in the California region, indicating that the compositi...

Despite extensive focus on the genetic legacy of Pleistocene glaciation, impacts of earlier climatic change on biodiversity are poorly understood. Because amphibians are highly sensitive to variations in precipitation and temperature, we use a genus of Chinese montane salamanders (Salamandridae: Pachytriton) to study paleoclimatic change in East Asia, which experienced intensification of its mo...

Even though presently indigenous to eastern Himalaya in India, no Engelhardioideae have been reported from the Cenozoic sediments of India till date. Here, we report first Indian occurrence a characteristic engelhardioid winged samaroid fruit having tri-lobed wing (oblong-ovate median lobe and two lateral lobes) globose nut latest Neogene (Pliocene: Rajdanda Formation) Chotanagpur Plateau, Indi...

The mollusc fauna from the Pliocene Viviparus beds of Vukomeričke Gorice hills in central Croatia was investigated at four sites in the region of Kravarsko, S of Zagreb. The region represents a Pleistocene horst-anticline at the southern margin of the Sava depression. Sediments are dominated by clay, bearing some sand, gravel and lignite intercalations. The molluscs, comprising 11 gastropod and...

Madagascar's flora and fauna are remarkable both for their diversity and supraspecific endemism. Moreover, many taxa contain large numbers of species with limited distributions. Several hypotheses have been proposed to explain this high level of microendemism, including 1) riverine barrier, 2) mountain refuge, and 3) watershed contraction hypotheses, the latter 2 of which center on fragmentatio...

How do populations of highly mobile species inhabiting open environments become reproductively isolated and evolve into new species? We test the hypothesis that elevated ocean-surface temperatures can facilitate allopatry among pelagic populations and thus promote speciation. Oceanographic modelling has shown that increasing surface temperatures cause localization and reduction of upwelling, le...

TheOrdovician volcanic and intrusive rocks of the Cadia–Neville region, in the southern Molong Volcanic Belt section of the Macquarie Arc in central-western New South Wales, display a temporal progression from shoshonitic basaltic volcanism (e.g. Mt Pleasant Basalt Member) in the late Darriwilian to Gisbornian (ca 460–453 Ma) to small-volume dacitic medium-K calc-alkaline magmatism (e.g. Copper...