Ordovician faunas of Burgess Shale type

The renowned soft-bodied faunas of the Cambrian period, which include the Burgess Shale, disappear from the fossil record in the late Middle Cambrian, after which the Palaeozoic fauna(1) dominates. The disappearance of faunas of Burgess Shale type curtails the stratigraphic record of a number of ico...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature
Main Authors: Van Roy, Peter, Orr, Patrick, Botting, Joseph, Muir, Lucy, Vinther, Jacob, Lefebvre, Bertrand, el Hariri, Khadija, Briggs, Derek EG
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: 2010
Subjects:
Earth and Environmental Sciences
BIOTAS
CANADA
BASIN
DIVERSITY
GERMANY
LAGERSTATTE
PRESERVATION
CAMBRIAN EXPLOSION
DEVONIAN HUNSRUCK SLATE
Burgess
Canada
canada basin
Online Access:https://biblio.ugent.be/publication/1252174
http://hdl.handle.net/1854/LU-1252174
https://doi.org/10.1038/nature09038
https://biblio.ugent.be/publication/1252174/file/1252176
Description
Summary:The renowned soft-bodied faunas of the Cambrian period, which include the Burgess Shale, disappear from the fossil record in the late Middle Cambrian, after which the Palaeozoic fauna(1) dominates. The disappearance of faunas of Burgess Shale type curtails the stratigraphic record of a number of iconic Cambrian taxa. One possible explanation for this loss is a major extinction(2,3), but more probably it reflects the absence of preservation of similar soft-bodied faunas in later periods(4). Here we report the discovery of numerous diverse soft-bodied assemblages in the Lower and Upper Fezouata Formations (Lower Ordovician) of Morocco, which include a range of remarkable stem-group morphologies normally considered characteristic of the Cambrian. It is clear that biotas of Burgess Shale type persisted after the Cambrian and are preserved where suitable facies occur. The Fezouata biota provides a link between the Burgess Shale communities and the early stages of the Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event.

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