The Capitanian (Late Guadalupian) Maokou Formation at Chaotian in northern Sichuan, South China, is composed mainly of shallow marine shelf carbonates deposited on the Tethyan side of South China. By detailed field mapping and scientific drilling, we newly found out unique fossil assemblages and a sharp lithologic change in the upper part of the Maokou Formation. The main part of the Maokou For...

The hypothesis that conodonts are vertebrates rests solely on evidence of soft tissue anatomy. This has been corroborated by microstructural, topological and developmental evidence of homology between conodont and vertebrate hard tissues. However, these conclusions have been reached on the basis of evidence from highly derived euconodont taxa and the degree to which they are representative of p...

The Triassic section north of Currie in southern Elko County, Nevada, is almost 500 m thick and is assigned to the Thaynes Group and overlying Shinarump Formation of the Chinle Group. The Thaynes Group disconformably overlies the Permian Gerster Formation and is mostly calcareous shale with interbedded wackestones that yield marine invertebrate fossils, especially ammonoids. The Shinarump Forma...

Identification of relevant taxonomic and evolutionary units is a recurrent issue in the fossil record, all more for ancient fossils devoid modern equivalents such as conodonts. Extensive morphological variation has often led to description numerous species, subspecies or morphotypes, which may correspond end-member morphologies reached through ontogeny. The platform elements Late Devonian conod...