EART 258 Deep Time Paleoclimates

Weekly lectures/readings/presentations focused on the key events in the long-term evolution of Earth's climate (i.e., before the Pliocene), including early Archean, faint, young-sun period; Proterozoic snowballs; Paleozoic glaciations and greenhouse events; the mid-Cretaceous oceanic anoxic events (OAEs); and Paleogene thermal maxima and glacial intervals. Considerable emphasis on evaluating the proxies of climate and mechanisms of climate change (e.g., greenhouse gasses, paleogeography).