A potential cephalopod from the early Cambrian of eastern Newfoundland, Canada

Abstract Although an early Cambrian origin of cephalopods has been suggested by molecular studies, no unequivocal fossil evidence has yet been presented. Septate shells collected from shallow-marine limestone of the lower Cambrian (upper Terreneuvian, c. 522 Ma) Bonavista Formation of southeastern N...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Communications Biology
Main Authors: Hildenbrand, Anne, Austermann, Gregor, Fuchs, Dirk, Bengtson, Peter, Stinnesbeck, Wolfgang
Other Authors: Klaus Tschira Stiftung
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Springer Science and Business Media LLC 2021
Subjects:
General Agricultural and Biological Sciences
General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology
Medicine (miscellaneous)
Canada
Newfoundland
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s42003-021-01885-w
http://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-021-01885-w.pdf
http://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-021-01885-w
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Summary:Abstract Although an early Cambrian origin of cephalopods has been suggested by molecular studies, no unequivocal fossil evidence has yet been presented. Septate shells collected from shallow-marine limestone of the lower Cambrian (upper Terreneuvian, c. 522 Ma) Bonavista Formation of southeastern Newfoundland, Canada, are here interpreted as straight, elongate conical cephalopod phragmocones. The material documented here may push the origin of cephalopods back in time by about 30 Ma to an unexpected early stage of the Cambrian biotic radiation of metazoans, i.e. before the first occurrence of euarthropods.

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