Fossilized 400-Million-Year-Old Forest Unearthed In Arctic Norway

Researchers have unearthed an ancient fossil forest from 380 million years ago in the Svalbard archipelago, located in the Norway's portion of the Arctic Ocean. This finding is revealing new information about what the earth's climate was like 400 million years ago, according to a study at Cardiff University in the UK.

"It's amazing that we've uncovered one of the very first forests in the very place that is now being used to preserve the earth's plant diversity," Dr. Chris Berry, from the university's School of Earth and Ocean Science, said in a news release. Berry was the one who identified and described the fossilized forest. "These fossil forests shows us what the vegetation and landscape were like on the equator 380 million years ago, as the first trees were beginning to appear on the earth," Berry said.

The researchers believe that the forest grew next to the equator around the late Devonian period (420-360 million years ago). The researchers also speculated that at the time CO2 levels in the atmosphere were quite low. Svalbard was located near the equator millions of years ago, before it was shifted to the north by tectonic plate drifting. The researchers found that the fossilized forest was mostly composed of lycopod trees, which grew millions of years ago.

"During the Devonian Period, it is widely believed that there was a huge drop in the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, from 15 times the present amount to something approaching current levels," Berry said.

The Svalbard area is a host to the 'Global Seed Vault,' which is has a range of well-preserved plant seeds, according to the researchers.

The findings of this study were published in the journal Geology.

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