TY  - INPR
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gca.2025.02.036
PB  - Elsevier BV
ID  - discovery10206055
N2  - The Devonian Period (?359?419 Ma) documents significant environmental changes and marine species turnover, but whether these changes were linked to terrestrial weathering remains unknown. Here, we use lithium isotopes in brachiopods and bulk marine carbonates (?7Licarb) from the Devonian Period to investigate changes in silicate weathering, which represents the primary long-term atmospheric CO2 sink. A rise of ? 10 ? in ?7Licarb values (from ? 8 ? to ? 18 ?) is observed across the Mid-Devonian (?378?385 Ma), suggesting a major change in the seawater Li cycle. We attribute the rise in ?7Licarb values to an increase in the dissolved riverine Li flux and ?7Liriver values, which likely arose from increases in both weathering intensity and regolith thickness, related to the expansion of deep-rooted plants. However, the presence of such terrestrial ecosystems would also have restricted the continuous weathering of silicate rocks. In order to maintain high ?7Liseawater values in the Late Devonian, we propose that repeated cycles of destruction and regeneration of terrestrial forest ecosystems could have occurred, which would have prevented a supply-limited weathering regime from being permanently established. Such a process would potentially have caused oscillations in marine nutrient availability and redox conditions, thereby contributing to prolonged marine biodiversity loss during the Late Devonian.
KW  - Li isotopes
KW  -  Devonian
KW  -  Biosphere
KW  -  Weathering
KW  -  Carbonate diagenesis
A1  - Liu, Xianyi
A1  - Krause, Alexander J
A1  - Wilson, David J
A1  - Fraser, Wesley T
A1  - Joachimski, Michael M
A1  - Brand, Uwe
A1  - Stigall, Alycia L
A1  - Qie, Wenkun
A1  - Chen, Bo
A1  - Yang, Xiangrong
A1  - Pogge von Strandmann, Philip AE
JF  - Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta
Y1  - 2025/03/01/
AV  - public
TI  - Lithium isotope evidence shows Devonian afforestation may have significantly altered the global silicate weathering regime
N1  - © 2025 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. under a Creative Commons license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
ER  -