Late Devonian extinction
E89373
The Late Devonian extinction was a prolonged series of biodiversity crises around 375–359 million years ago that devastated marine life, especially reef ecosystems and armored fishes, and ranks among the largest mass extinctions in Earth’s history.
All labels observed (8)
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T738731 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Late Devonian extinction Context triple: [Paleozoic Era, majorEvent, Late Devonian extinction]
-
A.
Permian–Triassic mass extinction
The Permian–Triassic mass extinction was the most severe biodiversity crisis in Earth's history, wiping out the majority of marine and terrestrial species around 252 million years ago and marking the boundary between the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras.
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B.
Early Devonian
The Early Devonian was the initial subdivision of the Devonian Period, marked by the diversification of early fishes and the spread of primitive vascular land plants across emerging terrestrial ecosystems.
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C.
Cambrian explosion
The Cambrian explosion was a relatively brief period around 541 million years ago when most major animal groups rapidly appeared in the fossil record, dramatically increasing the complexity and diversity of life on Earth.
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D.
Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary
The Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary marks the geological transition 66 million years ago associated with a mass extinction event that wiped out non-avian dinosaurs and many other species, likely triggered by a large asteroid impact.
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E.
Silurian
The Silurian is a geologic period of the Paleozoic Era, roughly 443 to 419 million years ago, marked by the stabilization of Earth’s climate, widespread shallow seas, and significant diversification of early marine life and the first land plants.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Late Devonian extinction Target entity description: The Late Devonian extinction was a prolonged series of biodiversity crises around 375–359 million years ago that devastated marine life, especially reef ecosystems and armored fishes, and ranks among the largest mass extinctions in Earth’s history.
-
A.
Permian–Triassic mass extinction
The Permian–Triassic mass extinction was the most severe biodiversity crisis in Earth's history, wiping out the majority of marine and terrestrial species around 252 million years ago and marking the boundary between the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras.
-
B.
Early Devonian
The Early Devonian was the initial subdivision of the Devonian Period, marked by the diversification of early fishes and the spread of primitive vascular land plants across emerging terrestrial ecosystems.
-
C.
Cambrian explosion
The Cambrian explosion was a relatively brief period around 541 million years ago when most major animal groups rapidly appeared in the fossil record, dramatically increasing the complexity and diversity of life on Earth.
-
D.
Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary
The Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary marks the geological transition 66 million years ago associated with a mass extinction event that wiped out non-avian dinosaurs and many other species, likely triggered by a large asteroid impact.
-
E.
Silurian
The Silurian is a geologic period of the Paleozoic Era, roughly 443 to 419 million years ago, marked by the stabilization of Earth’s climate, widespread shallow seas, and significant diversification of early marine life and the first land plants.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (47)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
biodiversity crisis
ⓘ
mass extinction event ⓘ paleontological event ⓘ |
| characterizedBy |
multiple extinction pulses
ⓘ
prolonged biodiversity loss ⓘ |
| effectOnEarthSystem |
collapse of reef-building communities
ⓘ
decline of jawless fishes ⓘ extinction of many placoderm lineages ⓘ restructuring of marine food webs ⓘ |
| endTime | approximately 359 million years ago ⓘ |
| followedBy |
Carboniferous diversification of vertebrates
ⓘ
expansion of tetrapods in Carboniferous ⓘ |
| hasConsequence |
long-term reduction in reef diversity
ⓘ
turnover in dominant fish groups ⓘ |
| hasDuration | several million years ⓘ |
| hasPeakExtinctionInterval |
Late Devonian extinction
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
surface form:
Frasnian–Famennian boundary
end-Devonian ⓘ |
| hasStratigraphicMarker |
Hangenberg black shales
ⓘ
Kellwasser horizons ⓘ |
| includesEvent |
Late Devonian extinction
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
surface form:
Hangenberg event
Kellwasser events ⓘ
surface form:
Kellwasser event
|
| locatedInTime | Paleozoic era ⓘ |
| occursIn |
Devonian Period
ⓘ
surface form:
Devonian period
|
| partOf | Phanerozoic mass extinctions ⓘ |
| possibleCause |
asteroid impact hypothesis
ⓘ
eutrophication of marine basins ⓘ global cooling ⓘ land plant expansion impacts on climate and oceans ⓘ ocean anoxia ⓘ sea-level fluctuations ⓘ volcanism ⓘ |
| primarilyAffected |
ammonoids
ⓘ
armored fishes ⓘ brachiopods ⓘ conodonts ⓘ coral reefs ⓘ marine ecosystems ⓘ placoderms ⓘ reef ecosystems ⓘ stromatoporoid reefs ⓘ trilobites ⓘ |
| rankInSize | among largest mass extinctions in Earth history ⓘ |
| startTime | approximately 375 million years ago ⓘ |
| studiedInDiscipline |
paleoecology
ⓘ
paleontology ⓘ stratigraphy ⓘ |
| temporalExtent | Late Devonian ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Late Devonian extinction Description of subject: The Late Devonian extinction was a prolonged series of biodiversity crises around 375–359 million years ago that devastated marine life, especially reef ecosystems and armored fishes, and ranks among the largest mass extinctions in Earth’s history.
Referenced by (14)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
this entity surface form:
Late Devonian extinction events
this entity surface form:
Frasnian–Famennian extinction event
this entity surface form:
Hangenberg event
this entity surface form:
Hangenberg event
Late Devonian extinction
→
hasPeakExtinctionInterval
→
Late Devonian extinction
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
this entity surface form:
Frasnian–Famennian boundary
this entity surface form:
Frasnian–Famennian mass extinction
this entity surface form:
Late Devonian mass extinction
this entity surface form:
Hangenberg event
this entity surface form:
Frasnian–Famennian extinction event
this entity surface form:
Late Devonian mass extinction
this entity surface form:
Frasnian–Famennian extinction event
this entity surface form:
Hangenberg extinction event