Did the Dinaric Alps force an arid climate and speciation during Miocene Climatic Optimum?

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Nevena Tomasevic
• Subject Area: Geology
• Term: since 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 517032148

Causal links between the rise of large mountain ranges such as the Andes and Himalayas and climate have been demonstrated. There, a significant uplift provokes climate change lead-ing to contrasting depositional environments and fauna speciation across the range. Consider-ing the sedimentary and paleontological records we test the hypothesis that this relationship exists and affects deposition and speciation to a similar degree in the lower mountain ranges such as the Dinaric Alps (Dinarides) in SE Europe. Sedimentological and paleontological data suggest that the topographic uplift of the Dinarides played an important role in the development of the regional contrasting, i.e. arid vs humid conditions and fauna distribution across the Dinarides during the Miocene Climatic Optimum (MCO). However, the analysis of causal relations is greatly hampered by the uncertainty about whether the basins across the mountain range were coeval or not. This uncertainty lies in very poor age constraints of the sedimentary successions in the internal part of the Dinarides. In this study, we will test the hypothesis that the growth of the Dinarides influenced contrasting climatic conditions leading to contrasting depositional environments and fauna speciation in the basins across the Dinarides during the MCO. This hypothesis will be tested by a systematic dating of the basins located in the internal part of the Dinarides using U-Pb dating of tuff layers and carbonate sediments. Furthermore, this will be supported by the revision of the temporal and spatial distribution of fauna across the range. Finally, integration of the new numerical age constraints provided by this work with the existing numerical ages (mostly constrained to the external part of the Dinarides) will allow us an orogen-wide correlation of sedimentary and faunal successions in the isolated basins. The resulting data framework will enable us to precisely assess causal links between the growth of the “small” mountain ranges, such as the Dinarides, the regional climate change, and the adaptive radiation of its biota.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: Austria
• Partner Organisation: Fonds zur Förderung der wissenschaftlichen Forschung (FWF)
• Cooperation Partner: Privatdozent Oleg Mandic, Ph.D.