Gaseous emissions from dinosaurs may have warmed prehistoric earth (Yes, yes, dinofarts…)

[OKIsItJustMe]

Oh, stop giggling already! This is science!

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-05/cp-gef050112.php

[font face=Serif]Public release date: 7-May-2012

Contact: Elisabeth (Lisa) Lyons
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Cell Press

[font size=5]Gaseous emissions from dinosaurs may have warmed prehistoric earth[/font]

[font size=3]Sauropod dinosaurs could in principle have produced enough of the greenhouse gas methane to warm the climate many millions of years ago, at a time when the Earth was warm and wet. That's according to calculations reported in the May 8th issue of Current Biology, a Cell Press publication.

The hulking sauropods, distinctive for their enormous size and unusually long necks, were widespread about 150 million years ago. As in cows, methane-producing microbes aided the sauropods' digestion by fermenting their plant food.

"A simple mathematical model suggests that the microbes living in sauropod dinosaurs may have produced enough methane to have an important effect on the Mesozoic climate," said Dave Wilkinson of Liverpool John Moores University. "Indeed, our calculations suggest that these dinosaurs could have produced more methane than all modern sources—both natural and man-made—put together."

…

Wilkinson, Ruxton, and Nisbet therefore calculate global methane emissions from sauropods to have been 520 million tons (520 Tg) per year, comparable to total modern methane emissions. Before industry took off on modern Earth about 150 years ago, methane emissions were roughly 200 Tg per year. By comparison, modern ruminant animals, including cows, goats, giraffes, and others, produce methane emission of 50 to 100 Tg per year.

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[OffWithTheirHeads]

1. When I saw that, I thought it was about the Republican party.