Fossil Localities (fossil + locality)

Distribution by Scientific Domains


Selected Abstracts


Latitudinal diversity gradients for brachiopod genera during late Palaeozoic time: links between climate, biogeography and evolutionary rates

GLOBAL ECOLOGY, Issue 4 2007
Matthew G. Powell
ABSTRACT Aim, The latitudinal diversity gradient, in which taxonomic richness is greatest at low latitudes and declines towards the poles, is a pervasive feature of the biota through geological time. This study utilizes fossil data to examine how the latitudinal diversity gradient and associated spatial patterns covaried through the major climate shifts at the onset and end of the late Palaeozoic ice age. Location, Data were acquired from fossil localities from around the world. Methods, Latitudinal patterns of diversity, mean geographical range size and macroevolutionary rates were constructed from a literature-derived data base of occurrences of fossil brachiopod genera in space and time. The literature search resulted in a total of 18,596 occurrences for 991 genera from 2320 localities. Results, Climate changes associated with the onset of the late Palaeozoic ice age (c. 327 Ma) altered the biogeographical structure of the brachiopod fauna by the preferential elimination of narrowly distributed, largely tropical genera when glaciation began. Because the oceans were left populated primarily with widespread genera, the slope of the diversity gradient became gentle at this time, and the gradient of average latitudinal range size weakened. In addition, because narrowly distributed genera had intrinsically high rates of origination and extinction, the gradients of both of these macroevolutionary rates were also reduced. These patterns were reversed when the ice age climate abated in early Permian time (c. 290 Ma): narrowly distributed genera rediversified at low latitudes, restoring steep gradients of diversity, average latitudinal range size and macroevolutionary rates. Main conclusions, During late Palaeozoic time, these latitudinal gradients for brachiopods may have been linked by the increased magnitude of seasonality during the late Palaeozoic ice age. Pronounced seasonality would have prevented the existence of genera with narrow latitudinal ranges. These results for the late Palaeozoic ice age suggest a climatic basis for the present-day latitudinal diversity gradient. [source]


Brief communication: Plio-Pleistocene eagle predation on fossil cercopithecids from the Humpata Plateau, southern Angola

AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY, Issue 3 2009
Christopher C. Gilbert
Abstract Recent studies suggest a large raptor such as the crowned eagle (Stephanaoetus coronatus) was responsible for collecting at least a portion of the primate fauna from the South African fossil site of Taung, including its lone hominin specimen. This taphonomic signature at Taung is currently regarded as a unique and, most likely, isolated case in primate and human evolution. However, the activities of large, carnivorous birds should also be detectable at other primate fossil localities in Africa if raptors have been a strong selective force throughout primate evolution. Over the last 60 years, a collection of extinct cercopithecids has been assembled from several cave breccias on the Humpata Plateau in southern Angola. The material, dated near the Plio-Pleistocene boundary, includes an assortment of craniodental and postcranial remains variably assigned to Papio (Dinopithecus) cf. quadratirostris, Parapapio, Cercopithecoides, and Theropithecus. We compare the Angolan and Taung material to remains of extant primates killed by crowned eagles in the Ivory Coast's Tai National Park. Our analysis indicates that the size distribution and composition of fauna from the localities is quite similar and that there are striking consistencies in damage to the crania from each site. The absence of large bodied (>20 kg) primates and other mammalian taxa at the Taung hominin locality and Tai, and their rarity in Angola, combined with the strong likelihood that raptor nests were positioned near fissure openings at both fossil localities, provides additional support for eagle involvement. On the basis of this evidence, we conclude that at least some of the Angolan cercopithecids were most likely raptor prey and hypothesize that raptor predation has been a strong and perhaps underappreciated selective force during the course of primate evolution. Am J Phys Anthropol 2009. © 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source]


Middle Jurassic Coptoclavidae (Insecta: Coleoptera: Dytiscoidea) from China: a Good Example of Mosaic Evolution

ACTA GEOLOGICA SINICA (ENGLISH EDITION), Issue 4 2010
WANG Bo
Abstract: Adults of the aquatic coptoclavid beetles (Coleoptera: Adephaga: Dytiscoidea), described from four Middle Jurassic fossil localities in Inner Mongolia and Liaoning in northeastern China, are attributed to Daohugounectes primitives Wang, Ponomarenko and Zhang, 2009, which was previously proposed after study of larvae. The generic name Timarchopsis Brauer, Redtenbacher and Ganglbauer, 1889 is proposed as a substitute for the preoccupied and junior homonym Necronectes Ponomarenko, 1977, non Milne-Edwards, 1881. Furthermore, the subfamily name Necronectinae Ponomarenko, 1977 is substituted by the available name Timarchopsinae. Daohugounectes is placed into Timarchopsinae because its adults have long, slightly apically widened tibiae and small femoral plates. The adults of this genus differ from those of other Timarchopsinae in the following features: antennae short and widened in the middle part; basal segments of protarsi not cut apically; metaventrite with a triangular plate. The larvae look like somewhat primitive forms in the subfamily Timarchopsinae. In contrast to these primitive larvae, the adults with some advanced characters can be regarded as among the most advanced forms in the subfamily Timarchopsinae, and probably represent a transition between the Timarchopsinae and Charanoscaphinae. Such mosaic evolution within Daohugounectes indicates that the evolutionary process of aquatic beetles is far more complex than previously thought. [source]