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The magnitude of temperature changes in the Early Jurassic are not well known. Clumped isotope measurements can potentially be used to provide better constrains, but unfortunately many of the well-studied sedimentary successions that preserve Lower Jurassic fossils experienced burial temperatures above the limits of preservation of Δ47, which for geological timescales is thought to be between 80–120 °C. Samples from these basins are expected to be partially reordered and yield apparent clumped isotope temperatures that are warmer than original values. Here, we explore whether useful paleoclimate information can be recovered from these samples. We test the hypothesis that relative temperature differences are preserved in partially reordered samples when they experience a common burial history. This was done with the use of reordering models and Δ47 measurements of early Jurassic belemnites from the Aubach section of the SW German Basin, a basin that has a relatively well constrained burial history with maximum burial temperatures above 90 °C. We find that even though partial reordering progressively erases the Δ47 difference between samples, the majority (>50%) of the signal is preserved when samples are buried at temperatures as high of 150 °C for up to 200 Ma. Moreover, the models demonstrate that – regardless of burial conditions – partially reordered samples always preserve minimum records of temperature change across climate events. These inferences are supported by the belemnite Δ47 data that show partially reordered compositions and warming/cooling patterns across the Early Jurassic that closely mimic observations from independent proxies. Model observations are used to interpret a 13 ± 4 °C (95% ci) temperature increase that is observed in the belemnite data across the Early Toarcian. The large magnitude of the temperature excursion is explained as a combination of warming and a change in belemnite habitat before and after the Toarcian Ocean Anoxic Event. Our results demonstrate the usefulness of partially reordered samples and further open the use of this proxy in deep time settings., Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, 293, ISSN:0016-7037, ISSN:1872-9533

Variations in the sulfur isotope composition of dissolved marine sulfate through time reflect changes in the global sulfur cycle and are intimately related to changes in the carbon and oxygen cycles. A large shift in the sulfur isotope composition of sulfate at the Permian/Triassic boundary has been recognized for long time and a number of studies were carried out to understand the causes and significance of this shift. However, data for the Middle and Late Triassic are very sparse and the stratigraphic evolution of the sulfur isotope composition of seawater is poorly constrained due to the small number of samples analyzed and/or due to the limited stratigraphic intervals studied. Moreover, in the last few years the Triassic timescale has significantly changed due to a wealth of new radiometric and stratigraphic data. In this study we show that for the Late Permian and the Triassic it is possible to obtain a precise reconstruction of the evolution of the sulfur cycle, for parts of it at sub-million year resolution, by analyzing exclusively gypsum and anhydrite deposits. We base our reconstruction on new data from the Middle and Late Triassic evaporites of Northern Switzerland and literature data from evaporites from Germany, Austria, Italy and the Middle East. We propose a revised correlation between the well-dated marine Tethyan sections in northern Italy and the evaporites from Northern Switzerland and from the Germanic Basin calibrated to the newest radiometric absolute age scale. This new correlation allows for a precise dating of the evaporites and constructing a composite sulfur isotope evolution of seawater sulfate from the latest Permian (Lopingian Epoch) to the Norian. We show that a rapid positive shift of approximately 24‰ at the Permian-Triassic boundary can be used to constrain seawater sulfate concentrations in the range of 2–6 mM, thus higher than previous estimates but with less rapid changes. Finally, we discuss two possible evolution scenarios for the Middle Triassic negative shift to values of 15‰ that subsequently remain constant during the Late Triassic.