[11] The Induan is succeeded by the Olenekian, whose GSSP is defined at the bottom of Bed A-2 of the Mikin Formation near Mud village, Spiti, India, with the appearance of the conodont Neospathodus waageni and a 13C peak.

They were defined using ammonite research conducted in large part by Mojsisovics and Diener in primarily Austria, Italy, and Bosnia; as well as Waagen's work in the Pakistani Salt Range.

[13][14] In 1956, Soviet paleontologists Lubov D. Kiparisova and Yurij N. Popov decided to divide the Lower Triassic series into, what they coined, the Induan and Olenekian stages.

[14] He named the Griesbachian after Griesbach Creek on Axel Heiberg Island, Canada, and further split it into the Gangetian and Ellesmarian substages; the former he defined by the ammonite zones of O. concavum and O. boreale, and the latter by Ophiceras commune and Proptychites striatus.

He named the Dienerian after Diener Creek on Ellesmere Island, Canada, and defined it by the ammonite zones P. candus and Vavilovites sverdrupi.

[14] In the 1990s, detailed studies of Otoceras sites in Tibet, Kashmir, Himalayas, Greenland, Svalbard and the Arctic territories of North America have revealed the problematic interval of existence of this genus.

[14] Coal is formed when plant matter decays into peat, which is then buried and subjected to heat and pressure over a long time.

The apparent marginalization of peat-producing plants has variously been explained to be a consequence of: high global elevation, excess acidity due to volcanic sulfur dioxide emissions or nitrous oxides from bolide (meteor) impact, the transition from an icehouse to a greenhouse Earth (the melting of the poles and surging global temperatures), excess plant predation by herbivores (insects or tetrapods) which evolved more efficient eating strategies (though they were quite diverse before even the Permian), or mass die-off of peat-producing plants.

[18] A major rifting zone existed on Madagascar, which was wedged in between the African and the Indian Plate, gradually pushing them apart.

Behind the burgeoning Neo-Tethys lay a major rift pushing India away from western Australia, which promulgated volcanoes across the area.

[18] The Induan followed the mass extinction event at the end of the Permian period, and historically, it was thought recovery was delayed by as much as five million years to the Middle Triassic.

The 21st century discoveries of diverse arrays of conodonts, ammonoids, bivalves, benthic foraminifera, and other ichnotaxa suggest that recovery instead took under 1.5 million years.

[25][26] Many genera show a cosmopolitan distribution during the Induan and Olenekian (e.g. Australosomus, Birgeria, Bobasatrania, Parasemionotidae, Pteronisculus, Ptycholepidae, Saurichthys, Whiteia).

[37][38] Induan chondrichthyan fishes include hybodonts, neoselachians and a few surviving lineages of eugeneodontid holocephalians,[39] a mainly Palaeozoic group.

Crocodile-shaped, marine temnospondyl amphibians (e.g. Aphaneramma, Wantzosaurus) were geographically widespread during the Induan and Olenekian ages.