Supplementary material from "Late Ediacaran life on land: desiccated microbial mats and large biofilm streamers"
The Ediacaran period witnessed transformational change across the Earth–life system, but life on land during this interval is poorly understood. Non-marine/transitional Ediacaran sediments preserve a variety of probable microbially induced sedimentary structures and fossil matgrounds, and the ecolog...
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ftdatacite:10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5680369.v1 2023-05-15T17:22:34+02:00 Supplementary material from "Late Ediacaran life on land: desiccated microbial mats and large biofilm streamers" McMahon, S. Matthews, J. J. Brasier, A. Still, J. 2021 https://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5680369.v1 https://rs.figshare.com/collections/Supplementary_material_from_Late_Ediacaran_life_on_land_desiccated_microbial_mats_and_large_biofilm_streamers_/5680369/1 unknown The Royal Society https://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2021.1875 https://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5680369 Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode cc-by-4.0 CC-BY 40308 Palaeontology incl. Palynology FOS Earth and related environmental sciences Collection article 2021 ftdatacite https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5680369.v1 https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2021.1875 https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5680369 2022-02-08T12:05:56Z The Ediacaran period witnessed transformational change across the Earth–life system, but life on land during this interval is poorly understood. Non-marine/transitional Ediacaran sediments preserve a variety of probable microbially induced sedimentary structures and fossil matgrounds, and the ecology, biogeochemistry and sedimentological impacts of the organisms responsible are now ripe for investigation. Here, we report well-preserved fossils from emergent siliciclastic depositional environments in the Ediacaran of Newfoundland, Canada. These include exquisite, mouldically preserved microbial mats with desiccation cracks and flip-overs, abundant Arumberia-type fossils and, most notably, assemblages of centimetre-to-metre-scale, subparallel, branching, overlapping, gently curving ribbon-like features preserved by aluminosilicate and phosphate minerals, with associated filamentous microfossils. We present morphological, petrographic and taphonomic evidence that the ribbons are best interpreted as fossilized current-induced biofilm streamers, the earliest record of an important mode of life (macroscopic streamer formation) for terrestrial microbial ecosystems today. Their presence shows that Late Ediacaran terrestrial environments could produce substantial biomass, and supports recent interpretations of Arumberia as a current-influenced microbial mat fossil, which we here suggest existed on a ‘streamer–arumberiamorph spectrum’. Finally, the absence of classic Ediacaran macrobiota from these rocks despite evidently favourable conditions for soft tissue preservation upholds the consensus that those organisms were exclusively marine. Article in Journal/Newspaper Newfoundland DataCite Metadata Store (German National Library of Science and Technology) Canada |
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40308 Palaeontology incl. Palynology FOS Earth and related environmental sciences |
spellingShingle |
40308 Palaeontology incl. Palynology FOS Earth and related environmental sciences McMahon, S. Matthews, J. J. Brasier, A. Still, J. Supplementary material from "Late Ediacaran life on land: desiccated microbial mats and large biofilm streamers" |
topic_facet |
40308 Palaeontology incl. Palynology FOS Earth and related environmental sciences |
description |
The Ediacaran period witnessed transformational change across the Earth–life system, but life on land during this interval is poorly understood. Non-marine/transitional Ediacaran sediments preserve a variety of probable microbially induced sedimentary structures and fossil matgrounds, and the ecology, biogeochemistry and sedimentological impacts of the organisms responsible are now ripe for investigation. Here, we report well-preserved fossils from emergent siliciclastic depositional environments in the Ediacaran of Newfoundland, Canada. These include exquisite, mouldically preserved microbial mats with desiccation cracks and flip-overs, abundant Arumberia-type fossils and, most notably, assemblages of centimetre-to-metre-scale, subparallel, branching, overlapping, gently curving ribbon-like features preserved by aluminosilicate and phosphate minerals, with associated filamentous microfossils. We present morphological, petrographic and taphonomic evidence that the ribbons are best interpreted as fossilized current-induced biofilm streamers, the earliest record of an important mode of life (macroscopic streamer formation) for terrestrial microbial ecosystems today. Their presence shows that Late Ediacaran terrestrial environments could produce substantial biomass, and supports recent interpretations of Arumberia as a current-influenced microbial mat fossil, which we here suggest existed on a ‘streamer–arumberiamorph spectrum’. Finally, the absence of classic Ediacaran macrobiota from these rocks despite evidently favourable conditions for soft tissue preservation upholds the consensus that those organisms were exclusively marine. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
McMahon, S. Matthews, J. J. Brasier, A. Still, J. |
author_facet |
McMahon, S. Matthews, J. J. Brasier, A. Still, J. |
author_sort |
McMahon, S. |
title |
Supplementary material from "Late Ediacaran life on land: desiccated microbial mats and large biofilm streamers" |
title_short |
Supplementary material from "Late Ediacaran life on land: desiccated microbial mats and large biofilm streamers" |
title_full |
Supplementary material from "Late Ediacaran life on land: desiccated microbial mats and large biofilm streamers" |
title_fullStr |
Supplementary material from "Late Ediacaran life on land: desiccated microbial mats and large biofilm streamers" |
title_full_unstemmed |
Supplementary material from "Late Ediacaran life on land: desiccated microbial mats and large biofilm streamers" |
title_sort |
supplementary material from "late ediacaran life on land: desiccated microbial mats and large biofilm streamers" |
publisher |
The Royal Society |
publishDate |
2021 |
url |
https://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5680369.v1 https://rs.figshare.com/collections/Supplementary_material_from_Late_Ediacaran_life_on_land_desiccated_microbial_mats_and_large_biofilm_streamers_/5680369/1 |
geographic |
Canada |
geographic_facet |
Canada |
genre |
Newfoundland |
genre_facet |
Newfoundland |
op_relation |
https://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2021.1875 https://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5680369 |
op_rights |
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode cc-by-4.0 |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5680369.v1 https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2021.1875 https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5680369 |
_version_ |
1766109295197290496 |