A silicified tommotiid from the lower Cambrian of Greenland

 

Authors: Skovsted CB

Published in: Bulletin of Geosciences, volume 91, issue 3; pages: 553 - 559; Received 22 March 2016; Accepted in revised form 4 October 2016; Online 11 November 2016

Keywords: Small Shelly Fossils, Tommotiida, eccentrothecimorph, Brachiopoda, silicification, Greenland,

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Abstract

Three specimens of a new eccentrothecimorph tommotiid are described from the Paralleldal Formation of North Greenland. The specimens are all tubular structures composed of a number of individual sclerites. The sclerites were arranged in rings, which fused to form a rigid tube during ontogeny. The tube has a basal aperture presumably allowing attachment to a hard substrate. In morphology, both individual sclerites and the tubular scleritome are remarkably similar to specimens of Eccentrotheca from South Australia. However, the Greenland specimens are silicified and may have been either weakly mineralised or calcareous in original composition. In this respect they differ from all previously known tommotiids, considerably expanding the ultrastructural disparity of the Tommotiida and allowing comparison to a new range of possible lophotrochozoan fossils.

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