THE ECOLOGICAL EVOLUTION OF REEFS
THE ECOLOGICAL EVOLUTION OF REEFS
复制标题
DOI:
10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.29.1.179
复制
发表时间:
1998-11
期刊:
影响因子:
--
通讯作者:
R. Wood
中科院分区:
文献类型:
--
作者:
R. Wood
▪ Abstract Many groups of extinct and extant organisms have aggregated to form reefs for over 3.5 billion yr (Ga). Most of these communities, however, grew under ecological and environmental controls profoundly different from those that govern modern coral reefs. Not only has the global distribution of reefs varied considerably through geological time—determined largely by sea level, and latitudinal temperature/saturation gradients—but more importantly the trophic demands of reef-building organisms have changed, as has the degree of biological disturbance faced by sessile biota in shallow marine environments. Reefs differentiated into open surface and cryptic communities as soon as open frameworks developed in the Proterozoic, some 1.9 million yr ago (mya) and diverse and complex ecosystems were established by the early Cambrian (∼520 mya). Calcified heterotrophs were conspicuous in reefs during the Paleozoic and early Mesozoic, but considerable rigidity was imparted to these often otherwise fragile commu...