BIOGEOGRAPHIC VARIABILITY AND ECOLOGICAL DYNAMICS OF MIDDLE – LATE PLEISTOCENE REEF CORALS

The Middle – Late Pleistocene (~1.2 – 0.125 Ma) climate is characterized by the intensification of cyclic oscillations between glacial (cool, low sea level) and interglacial (warm, high sea level) intervals. The fossil record, preserving a long-term dataset of coral reef communities composed of extant species, reveals that reef corals have persisted throughout the Pleistocene despite these frequent and dramatic climate fluctuations. Although it provides a valuable ecologic resource, the Middle to Late Pleistocene history of coral reef ecology remains largely unexplored, particularly in relation to climate changes during this critical period of reef expansion, and persistence, into modern reef ecosystems.

Using deep drill core records through reef environments, our work integrates taxonomic and trait-based paleontological data with paleoclimate, sedimentological, and tectonic interpretations as well as extant reef ecology to quantitatively evaluate the temporal distribution of coral taxa and functional traits in relation to Quaternary environmental transitions. The overarching goal is to highlight the effects of past global climate and environmental change on reef community taxonomic and trait composition during the Middle to Late Pleistocene, when modern reef systems developed. Current results indicate that globally there is biogeographic and environmental variability in reef development across the Middle to the Late Pleistocene, with local subsidence histories and amplified sea level oscillations over time likely largely contributing to these global patterns.