Continental drift applied to biogeography
Deriva continental como explicación biogeográfica
- Date
- 1912-1915 · confidence high
- Place
- Marburg, Germany
- Credited to
- Alfred Wegener
- People
- 👤 Alfred Wegener1880–1930
- Field
- Life & health
What was discovered
Wegener used the distribution of identical fossils (Mesosaurus, Glossopteris) on continents now separated as evidence that they had once been joined in Pangaea. It explained the puzzles of Wallace's and Darwin's biogeography.
Rejected until geophysical confirmation in the 1960s.
What it led to
- historical biogeography and vicariance
- plate tectonics (1960s)
- understanding of evolutionary radiations (marsupials, lemurs)
Built on
- Wallace's biogeography
- Gondwana fossils