An Underground Fossil Forest Offers Clues on Climate Change

New York Times: In the clammy depths of a southern Illinois coal mine lies the largest fossil forest ever discovered, at least 50 times as extensive as the previous contender. Scientists are exploring dripping passages by the light of headlamps, mapping out an ecosystem from 307 million years ago, just before the world's first great forests were wiped out by global warming. This vast prehistoric landscape may shed new light on climate change today. Dating from the Pennsylvanian period of the Carboniferous era,...

URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/01/science/underground-fossil-forest-in-illinois-offers-clues-on-climate-change.html
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