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NickB79

(20,062 posts)
Tue Aug 5, 2025, 09:41 AM Aug 5

They've been able to reconstruct Cretaceous air composition from fossilized dinosaur teeth, including CO2 levels

https://www.sciencealert.com/prehistoric-air-has-been-reconstructed-from-dinosaur-teeth-in-an-amazing-first

This part is why I'm posting this in EE:

Using enamel powders previously taken from specimens obtained from museum collections across Europe for other diet-related reconstructions, Tütken and his colleagues concluded concentrations of CO2 had been high during the Mesozoic; a finding in agreement with previous investigations into Earth's CO2 history.

In the late Jurassic, CO2 levels were at about 1,200 parts per million, for example; in the late Cretaceous, around 750 parts per million. By comparison, Earth's atmosphere currently has around 430 parts per million CO2, and counting.


We're potentially looking at Cretaceous-level CO2 readings by the end of this century.
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