Previous studies have suggested a variety of causes for the end-Permian extinction event including a bolide impact, flood basalt volcanism, methane clathrate dissociation, or some combination of catastrophic processes. One common feature of these hypotheses is the prediction of an enhanced earliest Triassic greenhouse. New high-resolution geochemical results from Graphite Peak, Antarctica suppo...

Two new species of the genus Sinosmylites Hong are described from the Middle Jurassic locality at Daohugou (Inner Mongolia, China): Sinosmylites fumosussp. n. and Sinosmylites rasnitsynisp. n. This is the oldest known occurrence of the family Berothidae. The berothid affinity of this genus is confirmed by examination of the hind wing venation characteristic of the family. The Late Triassic fami...

Tanytrachelos ahynis (n.gen., n. sp.) is a lepidosaur from the Late Triassic Dan River Group (Newark Supergroup) of North Carolina and Virginia. The new reptile has gracile proportions similar to Tanystropheus (Middle Triassic) and is referred to the family Tanystropheidae of the suborder Prolacertiformes. Unlike Tanystropheus, Tanytrachelos has relatively short cervical vertebrae bearing splin...

Evolutionary transitions in individuality (ETIs) underlie the watershed events in the history of life on Earth, including the origins of cells, eukaryotes, plants, animals, and fungi. Each of these events constitutes an increase in the level of complexity, as groups of individuals become individuals in their own right. Among the best-studied ETIs is the origin of multicellularity in the green a...

Models for the origin and deformation of Himalayan rocks are dependent upon geometric and age relationships between major units. We present fi eld mapping and U-Pb dating of igneous and detrital zircons that establish the lithostratigraphic architecture of the eastern Himalaya, revealing that: (1) the South Tibet detachment along the BhutanChina border is a top-to-the-north ductile shear zone; ...

The Triassic has long been recognized as a time during which marine and terrestrial ecosystems modernized dramatically, it seems to have two-step process. First, recovery from the Permian-Triassic mass extinction (PTME) was of extraordinary renewal novelty, these processes change were enhanced, seems, by effects Carnian Pluvial Episode (CPE). After CPE, in oceans, not only did carbonate factory...

The first findings of Antracoptilidae (Paoliida) from the Late Permian/ Early Triassic of Africa, i.e. the new genus Afrocladus comprising A. pumilio sp. nov. and A. kenyaensis sp. nov., are described from the Mombasa Basin of Maji ya Chumvi Formation in Kenya (Duruma sandstones). Both diagnoses are based on wing venation pattern. Their occurrences close to the P-T boundary possibly indicate th...

The classic Neotethyan Ankara Melange formed within the Triassic-Eocene İzmir-Ankara-Erzincan ocean (‘N Neotethys’), bordered in central Anatolia by Kırşehir and Tauride-Anatolide continental units to south discontinuous Sakarya continent northwest. Farther north, separate Intra-Pontide probably remained partly open until early Cenozoic. developed via phases of intra-oceanic accretion (mainly p...

Orbitally controlled, sedimentary cycles of the Newark Supergroup permit palyniferous Late Triassic sections to be calibrated in time. Carnian palynofloras from · the Richmond basin exhibit 2-m.y. fluctuations in the spore/pollen ratio, but taxonomic composition remains stable. Diversity of Norian and Rhaetian palynofloras increases prior to a 60% reduction at the Triassic/Jurassic boundary. Th...