Micro-scale analytical techniques permit correlation of chemistry with morphology of individual Proterozoic acritarchs (organic-walled microfossils), and thus provide new approaches for elucidating their biological affinities. A combination of micro-Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy and laser micro-Raman spectroscopy was used to investigate the organic structure and composition of ...

This paper presents a paleoenvironmental reconstruction from palynological analyses of a sedimentary core of Holocene age, drilled at municipality of Garopaba (Santa Catarina), Southern Brazil. A total of 46 samples was collected for palynological analyses in the 450 cm-long core PCSC-3, as also three samples for radiocarbon dating and granulometric analyses. The palynological content includes ...

A ca. 600 m thick siliciclastic succession in northern Russia contains abundant and diverse microfossils that document early to middle Ediacaran deposition along the northeastern margin of the East European Platform. The Vychegda Formation is poorly exposed but is well documented by a core drilled in the Timan trough region (Kel’tminskaya-1 borehole). Vychegda siliciclastics lie unconformably a...

Acritarchs are a group of organic-walled microfossils with unknown biological affinities. The wall ultrastructure of the unornamented, smooth Leiosphaeridia sp. and the acanthomorphic Gyalosphaeridium pulchrum from the Ediacaran Dey Dey Mudstone in the Officer Basin, South Australia, was studied by use of transmission and scanning electron microscopy, and transmitted light microscopy. The study...

The identification and confirmation of bona fide Archean-Paleoproterozoic microfossils can prove to be a challenging task, further compounded by diagenetic and metamorphic histories. While structures of likely biological origin are not uncommon in Precambrian rocks, the search for early fossil life has been disproportionately focused on lesser thermally altered rocks, typically greenschist or l...

Chia-Wei Li et al. describe microfossils found in Doushantuo phosphate rocks from Guizhou Province, South China that are about 580 million years old (1). Well-preserved macroscopic multicellular fossils associated with prokaryotic and eukaryotic microfossils from the same source rocks have been documented in several studies (2– 6). The Doushantuo fossils are outstanding in both preservation qua...

Molecular trees and geochemical markers suggest the divergence of dinoflagellates as early eukaryotes (~650 million years ago), but traditional fossil record cysts (dinocysts) starts during Triassic (~230 ago). A re-evaluation pre-Triassic shows that many acritarchs (microfossils uncertain affinities) are dinocysts representing “missing” evidence. Traditional diagnostic criteria for dinocysts, ...

Abstract The detailed record of diagnostic acritarchs from the volcanosedimentary Vallehondo and Playon formations, bracketed between Cambrian Stage 4 strata bearing trilobite Serrodiscus Guzhangian (Miaolingian) beds with Sao aff. hirsuta, allows establishment a fine acritarch-based chronostratigraphy. Seven interval zones are defined by first successive appearances cosmopolitan index acritarc...