Late Permian fish from Baltic States and Poland: taxonomy, palaeoecology and biostratigraphy

• Main Author: Dankina, Darja
• Other Authors: Radzevičius, Sigitas
• Format: Doctoral or Postdoctoral Thesis
• Language: Lithuanian; English
• Published: Institutional Repository of Vilnius University 1484
• Subjects: Zechstein sea; permian; teeth; .scales; Greenland
• Online Access: http://vu.oai.elaba.lt/documents/106731913.pdf; http://vu.lvb.lt/VU:ELABAETD106731913&prefLang=en_US

This work is dedicated to the study of the taxonomy, palaeocology, and biostratigraphy of fishes that lived in the easternmost part of the Zechstein Basin and is based on the new material collected from quarries located in Lithuania, Latvia, and Poland. The late Permian Zechstein Basin is a marine and partly evaporitic intracratonic basin which was formed when the Boreal Ocean broke in the NW part of Pangea immediately forming an enclosed sea. This sea extended from the modern area of eastern part of England and Greenland through northern part of Denmark, Netherlands and Germany, into Poland up to the western part of Lithuania and the southern part of Latvia. Current developments in palaeontological, sedimentological, and palaeobiological research revealed that the end-Permian (Lopingian) was one of the most studied time periods from the Phanerozoic. During this time, the Earth experienced two phases of the end-Permian mass extinction, which significantly affected the long-term macroevolution. Fish were the most common vertebrates in the Palaeozoic marine communities. Due to the easy accessibility and great thickness of Permian geological outcrops in Lithuania, Latvia, and Poland, their studies promise important insights in the found here Helodus sp., Acrodus sp., Omanoselache sp., Gansuselache sp., Euselachii, and Actinopterygii palaeogeography. This work consists of high-resolution studies of changes in Chondrichthyes and Osteichthyes abundances, patterns of their group appearances in the vertical cross section, and also integrated fish biostratigraphy and palaeocology in the study area.