Great Paleozoic-Mesozoic Biotic Turnings and Paleontological Education in China: A Tribute to the Achievements of Professor Zunyi Yang

Professor Zunyi Yang is a pioneer paleontologist who established the earliest Paleontological education and research in China, and has contributed his lifetime to promotion of Chinese paleontological education and researches as well as the studies on the Permian-Triassic (P-Tr) mass extinction and its possible causes. Yang has studied six fossil clades and trace fossils, together with his colleagues, he has established 6 new species of cephalopods, 1 new genus and 15 new species of gastropods, 8 new genera and 31 new species of bivalves, 17 new genera and 66 new species of brachiopods, 1 new genus and 4 new species of ophiuroids, 2 new genera and 7 new species of triopsids (Crustacea), and 3 new ichnogenera and 7 new ichnospecies of trace fossils. Yang led the 2nd IGCP working on the P-Tr mass extinction in the world. His group’s excellent works on basic stratigraphy and paleontology enable the GSSP of P-Tr boundary (PTB) to be ratified in China. Yang’s earlier works on three-episode extinction pattern and volcanism-causing extinction hypothesis are also highlighted here to show how their first-hand data and initiative hypothesis have influenced the current and ongoing debates on the P-Tr crisis and possible causation. Yang school’s extinction pattern is reviewed here, and their 2nd phase of extinction is marked by a dramatic loss in biodiversity, pointing to a widely accepted mass extinction. The 3rd extinction is characterized by ecological collapse of ecosystem structures and disappearance of the PTB microbialite ecosystem, while the 1st extinction (also prelude extinction) is indicated by the collapses of deep-water and reef ecosystems. Updated studies show that the volcanic ashes near the PTB originated from silicic, subduction-related igneous activity with little or no basaltic input. This subduction zone activity is related to closure of the Paleo-Tethys Ocean, and the intensity and frequency of the volcanic activity appear to increase near the P-Tr extinction interval. Hg anomalies (Hg/TOC ratios and Hg isotopes) were also detected from the P-Tr extinction interval, and they are interpreted as the results of enhanced volcanic-generated atmospheric mercury, which was injected by the violate eruption of the Siberian traps. Thus, the peak felsic volcanism is coeval with violate eruption of Siberian traps, and the coupled relationship between both types of volcanisms and biotic extinction suggests a causal relationship.