Molaria (Euarthropoda) from the Sirius Passet Lagerstätte (Cambrian Series 2, Stage 3) of North Greenland

 

Authors: Peel JS

Published in: Bulletin of Geosciences, volume 92, issue 2; pages: 133 - 142; Received 19 January 2017; Accepted in revised form 26 May 2017; Online 23 June 2017

Keywords: Cambrian, euarthropod, Sirius Passet, Lagerstätte, Greenland,

full text (PDF, 2.34 MB)

Export to RIS

 

Abstract

A second species of the characteristic Burgess Shale euarthropod Molaria Walcott, 1912 is described from the Sirius Passet Lagerstätte of North Greenland, thus extending its range from Cambrian Series 3 (Stage 5) back into Series 2 (Stage 3). Molaria steini sp. nov. differs from the type species, M. spinifera Walcott, 1912, in having 9 trunk tergites and lacking an elongate connecting segment between the trunk and the jointed telson. Exopod setal fringes are similar to those in the artiopod Emeraldella Walcott, 1912 from the Burgess Shale but other details of limbs remain obscure.

References

BABCOCK, L.E. & PEEL, J.S. 2007. Palaeobiology, taphonomy, and stratigraphic significance of the trilobite Buenellus from the Sirius Passet Biota, Cambrian of North Greenland. Memoirs of the Association of Australasian Palaeontologists 34, 401-418.

BLAKER, M.R. 1988. A new genus of nevadiid trilobite from the Buen Formation (Early Cambrian) of Peary Land, central North Greenland. Gronlands Geologiske Undersogelse Rapport 137, 33-41. View article

BLAKER, M.R. & PEEL, J.S. 1997. Lower Cambrian trilobites from North Greenland. Meddelelser om Gronland, Geoscience 35, 145 pp.

BOTTING, J. & PEEL, J.S. 2016. Early Cambrian sponges of the Sirius Passet Biota, North Greenland. Papers in Palaeontology 2, 463-467.View article

BOTTING, J., CARDENAS, P. & PEEL, J.S. 2015. A crown-group demosponge from the early Cambrian Sirius Passet Biota, North Greenland. Palaeontology 58, 35-43.View article

BUDD, G.E. 1995. Kleptothule rasmusseni gen et sp. nov.: an ?olenellinid-like trilobite from the Sirius Passet fauna (Buen Formation, Lower Cambrian, North Greenland). Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Earth Science 86, 1-12.View article

BUDD, G.E. 1997. Stem group arthropods from the Lower Cambrian Sirius Passet fauna of North Greenland, 125-138. In FORTEY, R.A. & THOMAS, A.H. (eds), Arthropod Relationships. The Systematics Association Special Volume 55.

BUDD, G.E. 1998. Arthropod body-plan evolution in the Cambrian with an example from anomalocaridid muscle. Lethaia 31, 197-210.View article

BUDD, G.E. 1999. A nektaspid arthropod from the early Cambrian Sirius Passet fauna, with a description of retrodeformation, based on functional morphology. Palaeontology 42, 99-122.View article

BUDD, G.E. 2011. Campanamuta mantonae gen. et sp. nov., an exceptionally preserved arthropod from the Sirius Passet Fauna (Buen Formation, lower Cambrian, North Greenland). Journal of Systematic Palaeontology 9, 217-260.View article

BUTLER, A.D., CUNNINGHAM, J.A., BUDD, G.E. & DONOGHUE, P.C.J. 2015. Experimental taphonomy of Artemia reveals the role of endogenous microbes in mediating decay and fossilization. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B 282, 1-10.View article

BUTTERFIELD, N.J. 2002. Leanchoilia guts and the interpretation of three-dimensional structures in Burgess Shale-type fossils. Paleobiology 28, 155-171.View article

BUTTERFIELD, N.J., BALTHASAR, U., & WILSON, L.A. 2007 Fossil diagenesis in the Burgess Shale. Palaeontology 50, 537-543.View article

CARON, J.-B., GAINES, R.R., ARIA, C., MÁNGANO, M.G. & STRENG, M. 2014. A new phyllopod bed-like assemblage from the Burgess Shale of the Canadian Rockies. Nature communications 5:3210, 1-6.View article

CONWAY MORRIS, S. & PEEL, J.S. 1995. Articulated halkieriids from the Lower Cambrian of of North Greenland and their role in early protostome evolution. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 347, 305-358.View article

CONWAY MORRIS, S. & PEEL, J.S. 2008. The earliest annelids: Lower Cambrian polychaetes from the Sirius Passet Lagerstätte, Peary Land, North Greenland. Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 53, 137-148.View article

CONWAY MORRIS, S., PEEL, J.S., HIGGINS, A.K., SOPER, N.J. & DAVIS, N.C. 1987. A Burgess Shale-like fauna from the Lower Cambrian of Greenland. Nature 326, 181-183.View article

EDGECOMBE, G.D., PATERSON, J.R. & GARCÍA-BELLIDO, D.C. 2017. A new aglaspid-like euarthropod from the lower Cambrian Emu Bay Shale of South Australia. Geological Magazine 184, 87-95.View article

FU, D., ZHANG, X. & SHU, D. 2011. Soft anatomy of the Early Cambrian arthropod Isoxys curvirostratus from the Chengjiang biota of South China with a discussion of the origination of great appendages. Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 56, 843-852.View article

GAINES, R.R., HAMMARLUND, E.U., HOU, X., QI, C., GABBOTT, S.E., ZHAO, Y., PENG, J. & CANFIELD, D.E. 2012. Mechanism for Burgess Shale-type preservation. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 109, 5180-5184.View article

GARCÍA-BELLIDO, D., PATERSON, J., EDGECOMBE, G., JAGO, J., GEHLING, J. & LEE, M. 2009a. The bivalved arthropods Isoxys and Tuzoia with soft part preservation from the Lower Cambrian Emu Bay Shale (Kangaroo Island, Australia). Palaeontology 52, 1221-1241.View article

GARCÍA-BELLIDO, D., VANNIER, J. & COLLINS, D. 2009b. Soft-part preservation in two species of the arthropod Isoxys from the middle Cambrian Burgess Shale of British Columbia. Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 54, 699-712.View article

HAUG, C. & HAUG, J.T. 2016. New insights into the appendage morphology of the Cambrian trilobite-like arthropod Naraoia compacta. Bulletin of Geosciences 91, 221-227.View article

HESSELBO, S.P., 1992. Aglaspida (Arthropoda) from the Upper Cambrian of Wisconsin. Journal of Paleontology 66, 885-923.View article

HIGGINS, A.K., INESON, J.R., PEEL, J.S., SURLYK, F. & SONDERHOLM, M. 1991. Lower Palaeozoic Franklinian Basin of North Greenland. Gronlands Geologiske Undersogelse Bulletin 160, 71-139. HOU, X. & BERGSTRÖM, J. 1997. Arthropods of the Lower Cambrian Chengjiang fauna, southwest China. Fossils & Strata 45, 1-116.

HOU, X., ALDRIDGE, R.J., BERGSTRÖM, J., SIVETER, D.J., SIVETER, D.J., & FENG, X.H. 2004. The Cambrian Fossils of Chengjiang, China. The Flowering of Early Animal Life. 233 pp. Blackwell Science Ltd., Malden, Massachusetts.

HOU, X., CHEN, J. & LU, H. 1989. Early Cambrian new arthropods from Chengjiang, Yunnan. Acta Palaeontologica Sinica 28, 42-57. [in Chinese with English summary]

INESON, J.R., & PEEL, J.S. 1997. Cambrian shelf stratigraphy of North Greenland. Geology of Greenland Survey Bulletin 173, 1-120. View article

INESON, J.R., & PEEL, J.S. 2011. Geological and depositional setting of the Sirius Passet Lagerstätte (early Cambrian), North Greenland. Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 48, 1259-1281.View article

LAGEBRO, L., STEIN, M. & PEEL, J.S. 2009. A new ?lamellipedian arthropod from the early Cambrian Sirius Passet Fauna of North Greenland. Journal of Paleontology 83, 820-825.View article

LEGG, D.A., SUTTON, M.D. & EDGECOMBE, G.D. 2013. Arthropod fossil data increase congruence of morphological and molecular phylogenies. Nature communications 4:2485, 1-7.View article

MANGANO, M.G., BROMLEY, R.G., HARPER, D.A.T., NIELSEN, A.T., SMITH, M.P. & VINTHER, J. 2012. Nonbiomineralized carapaces in Cambrian seafloor landscapes (Sirius Passet, Greenland): opening a new window into early Phanerozoic benthic ecology. Geology 40, 519-522.View article

MINELLI, A., BOXSHALL, G. & FUSCO, G. (eds) 2013. Arthropod biology and evolution: molecules, development, morphology. 532 pp. Springer-Verlag, Berlin & Heidelberg.

ORR, P.J. & KEARNS, S.L. 2011 X-ray microanalysis of Burgess Shale and similarly preserved fossils, 271-299. In LAFLAMME, M., SCHIFFBAUER, J.D. & DORNBOS, S.Q. (eds) Numerical approaches to the evaluation of fossils and ancient ecosystems. Springer Science+Business Media, Dordrecht, Heidelberg, London, New York. View article

ORTEGA-HERNÁNDEZ, J., LEGG, D.A. & BRADDY, S.J. 2013. The phylogeny of aglaspidid arthropods and the internal relationships within Artiopoda. Cladistics 29, 15-45.View article

PATERSON, J.R., EDGECOMBE, G.D., GARCÍA-BELLIDO, D.C., JAGO, J. & GEHLING, J.G. 2010. Nektaspid arthropods from the lower Cambrian Emu Bay Shale Lagerstätte, South Australia, with a reassessment of lamellipedian relationships. Palaeontology 53, 377-402.View article

PATERSON, J.R., GARCÍA-BELLIDO, D.C., JAGO, J., GEHLING, J.G., LEE, M.S.Y. & EDGECOMBE, G.D. 2015. The Emu Bay Shale Konservat-Lagerstätte: a view of Cambrian life from East Gondwana. Journal of the Geological Society 173, 1-11.View article

PEEL, J.S. 2010. Articulated hyoliths and other fossils from the Sirius Passet Lagerstätte (early Cambrian) of North Greenland. Bulletin of Geosciences 85, 385-394.View article

PEEL, J.S. 2017. Mineralized gutfills from the Sirius Passet Lagerstätte (Cambrian Series 2) of North Greenland. GFF 139, 83-91.View article

PEEL, J.S. & INESON, J.R. 2011. The Sirius Passet Lagerstätte (early Cambrian) of North Greenland. Palaeontographica Canadiana 31, 109-118.

PEEL, J.S. & INESON, J.R. 2011b. The extent of the Sirius Passet Lagerstätte (early Cambrian) of North Greenland. Bulletin of Geoscience 86, 535-543.View article

PEEL, J.S. & STEIN, M. 2009. A new arthropod from the lower Cambrian Sirius Passet Fossil-Lagerstätte of North Greenland. Bulletin of Geosciences 84, 625-630.View article

PEEL, J.S., STEIN, M. & KRISTENSEN, R.M. 2013. Life cycle and morphology of a Cambrian stem-lineage loriciferan. PLoS ONE 8(8):e73583, 1-20.View article

RAASCH, G.O. 1939. Cambrian Merostomata. Geological Society of America Special Paper 16, 1-146.

SHU, D., ZHANG, X. & GEYER, G. 1995. Anatomy and systematic affinities of the Lower Cambrian bivalved arthropod Isoxys auritus. Alcheringa 19, 333-342.View article

SIMONETTA, A.M. 1964. Osservazioni sugli artropodi non trilobiti della ’Burgess Shale’ (Cambriano medio). III Contributo. Monitore zoológico italiano 72, 215-231.

SIMONETTA, A.M. & DELLE CAVE, L. 1975. The Cambrian non trilobite arthropods from the Burgess Shale of British Columbia. A study of their comparative morphology, taxonomy and evolutionary significance. Palaeontographica italica 69, 1-37.

SIMONETTA, A.M. & DELLE CAVE, L. 1991. Early Palaeozoic arthropods and problems of arthropod phylogeny; with some notes on taxa of doubtful affinities, 189-244. In SIMONETTA, A.M. & CONWAY MORRIS, S. (eds) The early evolution of Metazoa and the significance of problematic taxa. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

STEIN, M. 2010. A new Cambrian arthropod from Greenland. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 158, 477-500.View article

STEIN, M., BUDD, G.E., PEEL, J.S. & HARPER, D.A.T. 2013. Arthroaspis n. gen., a common element of the Sirius Passet Lagerstätte (Cambrian, North Greenland), sheds light on trilobite ancestry. BMC Evolutionary Biology 2013 13(99), 1-34.View article

STEIN, M., CHURCH, S.B. & ROBISON, R.A. 2011. A new Cambrian arthropod, Emeraldella brutoni, from Utah. Palaeontological Contributions 3, 1-9.

STEIN, M., PEEL, J.S., SIVETER, D.J., & WILLIAMS, M. 2010. Isoxys (Arthropoda) with preserved soft anatomy from the Sirius Passet Lagerstätte, lower Cambrian of North Greenland. Lethaia 43, 258-265.View article

STEIN, M. & SELDEN, P.A. 2012. A restudy of the Burgess Shale (Cambrian) arthropod Emeraldella brocki and a reassessment of its affinities. Journal of Systematic Palaeontology 10, 361-383.View article

STRANG, K.M., ARMSTRONG, H.A. & HARPER, D.A.T. 2016a. Minerals in the gut: scoping a Cambrian digestive system. Royal Society Open Science 3, 160420, 1-9.View article

STRANG, K.M., ARMSTRONG, H.A., HARPER, D.A.T. & TRA - BUCHO-ALEXANDRE, J.P. 2016b. The Sirius Passet Lagerstätte: silica death masking opens the window on the earliest mat ground community of the Cambrian explosion. Lethaia 49, 631-643.View article

VAN ROY, P. 2006. An aglaspidid arthropod from the Upper Ordovician of Morocco with remarks on the affinities and limitations of Aglaspidida. Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh: Earth Sciences 96, 327-350.

VANNIER, J. & CHEN, J. 2000. The Early Cambrian colonization of pelagic niches exemplified by Isoxys (Arthropoda). Lethaia 33, 295-311.View article

VANNIER LIU, J., LEROSEY-AUBRIL, R., VINTHER, J. & DALEY, A.C. 2014. Sophisticated digestive systems in early Arthropods. Nature communications 5:3641, 1-9.View article

VINTHER, J., EIBYE-JACOBSEN, D. & HARPER, D.A.T. 2011a. An Early Cambrian stem polychaete with pygidial cirri. Biology letters 7, 929-932.View article

VINTHER, J., PORRAS, L., YOUNG, F.J., BUDD, G.E. & EDGECOMBE, G.D. 2016. The mouth apparatus of the Cambrian gilled lobopodian Pambdelurion whittingtoni. Palaeontology 59, 841-849.View article

VINTHER, J., SMITH, M.P. & HARPER, D.A.T. 2011b. Vetulicolians from the Lower Cambrian Sirius Passet Lagerstätte, North Greenland, and the polarity of morphological characteristics in basal deuterostomes. Palaeontology 54, 711-719.View article

WALCOTT, C.D. 1890. The fauna of the Lower Cambrian or Olenellus Zone. Reports of the U.S. Geological Survey 10, 509-763.

WALCOTT, C.D. 1911. Cambrian geology and palaeontology II. Middle Cambrian Merostomata. Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collection 57, 17-40.

WALCOTT, C.D. 1912. Middle Cambrian Branchiopoda, Malacostraca, Trilobita, and Merostomata. Cambrian Geology and Paleontology, II. Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collection 57, 145-228.

WALOSSEK, D. 1999. On the Cambrian diversity of Crustacea, 3-27. In SCHRAM, F.R. & VON VAUPEL KLEIN, J.C. (eds) Crustaceans and the Biodiversity Crisis, Proceedings of the Fourth International Crustacean Congress, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, July 20-24, 1998 vol. 1. Brill Academic Publishers, Leiden.

WATABE, N. 1989. Calcium phosphate structures in invertebrates and protozoans, 35-44. In CARTER, J.G. (ed.) Skeletal biomineralization: patterns, processes and evolutionary trends. Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York; Chapman & Hall, London.

WHITTINGTON, H.B. 1971. The Middle Cambrian trilobite Naraoia, Burgess Shale, British Columbia. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 280, 409-443.View article

WHITTINGTON, H.B. 1981. Rare arthropods from the Burgess Shale, Middle Cambrian, British Columbia. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 292, 329-357.View article

WILLIAMS, M., SIVETER, D.J., & PEEL, J.S. 1996. Isoxys (Arthropoda) from the Early Cambrian Sirius Passet Lagerstätte, North Greenland. Journal of Paleontology 70, 947-954.View article

ZACAI, A., VANNIER, J. & LEROSEY-AUBRIL, R. 2016. Reconstructing the diet of a 505-million-year-old arthropod: Sidneyia inexpectans from the Burgess Shale fauna. Arthropod Structure and Development 45, 200-220.View article

ZHANG, X. & SHU, D. 2005. A new arthropod from the Chengjiang Lagerstätte, Early Cambrian, southern China. Alcheringa 29, 185-194.View article