The first record in Eastern Europe of a putative non-biomineralised macroalga of the genus Plumalina is described from the upper Famennian (Upper Devonian) deposits of the southern Donets Basin (eastern Ukraine). The only studied specimen originates from limestones in the upper part of the Maf-Khaia Formation. The specimen exhibits a morphology that is not entirely typical for Plumalina, namely the presence of fine longitudinal ribs on the stem of the thallus. This feature distinguishes the studied specimen from other species of the genus; it is therefore quite possible that it represents a new species, but the limited amount and poor preservation of the material do not allow its formal establishment. The main part of the range of Plumalina during the Devonian Period was located in North America, with the only European occurrence of the genus previously recorded from the Middle Devonian of Germany. The occurrence of Plumalina in marine basins on opposite sides of Laurussia suggests at least intermittent connectivity between these regions, probably within the Rheic Ocean corridor.
Ornithomimosauria is a striking theropod dinosaur group whose unusual traits have generated debate about several behaviours related to diet and lifestyle. Although the palaeoneuroanatomy might provide valuable information to palaeobiological studies of this group, these studies are scarce. Only the endocast of Struthiomimus is known, despite several complete skulls having been recovered in this group. In other non-avian maniraptoriforms, palaeoneuroanatomical studies are not overly plentiful either, restricting themselves to well-characterised endocasts within Therizinosauria and Oviraptorosauria. Here, we present the palaeoneuroanatomy of the endocranial cavity of Pelecanimimus polyodon, an ornithomimosaur from the Early Cretaceous of Cuenca (Spain). The occipital region of its braincase is studied using CT scans, providing information about the inner ear, the hindbrain, cranial nerves, and vascular tracts. Its endocranial morphology is similar to Struthiomimus and follows the evolutionary trends of Coelurosauria. Pelecanimimus shows a reduced and posterior dural peak, and elongated semicircular canals; thus, good gaze stabilisation is inferred and strongly agrees with the non-avian to avian brain evolution. The lagena of Pelecanimimus is short, so high-frequency values of hearing are inferred for the taxon compared with other non-avian theropods. Those results are expected for an early-branching maniraptoriform, and positively contribute to our knowledge of the evolution of Coelurosauria and Theropoda.
El Profesor Miquel De Renzi de la Fuente, paleontólogo catalán, ha sido una figura central en la paleontología española, especialmente desde la Universitat de València, en donde ha desarrollado gran parte de su carrera académica. Con la presente recopilación de contribuciones queremos rendir homenaje a su figura.
The site of Quibas (Early Pleistocene, Murcia, Spain) represents the only European continuous succession preserving a record of continental vertebrates from pre-Jaramillo to post-Jaramillo age. The Quibas sequence immediately postdates the oldest known hominin records in the Early Pleistocene of Europe, represented at Barranco León and Fuente Nueva 3 (southern Spain), and Sima del Elefante (northern Spain). This study presents new evidence on the taphonomic processes that facilitated the accumulation of small vertebrates at the unit QS-2/3 of the Quibas-Sima section. We analysed alterations caused by predators (digestion and chewing), root marks, mineral precipitation, bone breakage, abrasion, corrosion, and the count of long bones. The results indicate that the accumulation of small mammals occurred in situ, primarily due to the activity of nocturnal birds of prey such as Strix aluco. The hydrodynamic influence is minimal. The paleoecological analysis supports the development of a forest-mosaic environment with a significant presence of open spaces in the surroundings of the Quibas site at the onset of the Jaramillo subchron.
Research into the Quaternary period is fundamental to understand the modern distribution of biomes and ecosystem assemblages around the world. The climatic cyclicity of the Pleistocene coupled with the adaptive evolution of its ecosystems throughout the Cenozoic resulted in the composition and extent we observe today. To obtain a higher resolution picture of past ecological changes it is necessary to approach from different and complementary methodological perspectives. In this paper, we focus on the analysis of stable carbon isotopes in hippo tooth enamel. The data obtained come both from new analyses carried out at the Vallparadís Estació site (Terrassa, NE Iberia) and from the compilation of all previously published data. The ultimate aim of this approach is to obtain information on the distribution of different grassland types and their associated ecosystems during the Quaternary in Europe, Africa and Asia. The results of this study highlight the effectiveness of stable isotope analysis of hippo enamel as a valuable tool for monitoring changes in grassland vegetation structure. This approach facilitates climatic inferences and, in particular, clarifies interactions between biomes and faunal responses at a global scale.
Abundant crocodylian fossil remains from the Early Miocene locality of Monte la Pila, which have not been studied previously, are described here. This fossil site is located in the municipality of Lardero, a few kilometers from Logroño (La Rioja, Spain), in the Ebro Basin (late Aquitanian–early Burdigalian). The recovered material includes one hundredand twenty-one disarticulated and isolated specimens. Despite the incompleteness of the remains, certain diagnostic features within the genus Diplocynodon are unambiguouslyrecognized in the studied material. Based on the identification of some of these characters, the material has been assigned to Diplocynodon sp. This assignment confirms the presence of this taxon in the late Aquitanian–early Burdigalian of the Iberian Peninsula.It also provides valuable data on the anatomical characteristics and distribution of the crocodile fauna on the Iberian Peninsula during the Lower Miocene.
La presencia del tracto digestivo constituye una valiosa fuente de información para comprender las estrategias alimentarias de los organismos fósiles. Sin embargo, la preservación de tejido blando suele estar limitada a yacimientos con preservación excepcional, como el yacimiento español de Las Hoyas (Barremiense, Cretácico). La revisión de 1134 fósiles de teleósteos permitió identificar, en la cavidad abdominal, tejidos blandos atribuibles a distintos órganos internos y materia en digestión (consumulitos). De entre los órganos internos preservados, se encuentran diferencias estructurales entre los tractos digestivos de Rubiesichthys gregalis, Teleostei incertae sedis n. sp. 1 y Teleostei incertae sedis n. sp. 2. La morfología del tracto digestivo y la presencia de inclusiones en los consumulitos indican una dieta omnívora en los teleósteos de Las Hoyas, con relativa especialización hacia la digestión de grandes cantidades de materia orgánica, incluyéndose restos de otros peces y crustáceos. Estas interpretaciones matizan previas interpretaciones ecológicas sobre los teleósteos en el ecosistema. En paralelo, la identificación a nivel de tejido blando en dos especies distintas tradicionalmente agrupadas bajo la categorización de Teleostei incertae sedis indica que la relativa baja diversidad de teleósteos de Las Hoyas, en realidad, revela ciertas especializaciones anatómicas relevantes para la comprensión de estos linajes en el futuro.
Symbiotic (mutualistic) relationships are hypothesized for species of the tabulate coral genus Cladochonus McCoy, 1847 associated with trepostome and cryptostome bryozoans in the Devonian. The species Cladochonus isaacmariai n. sp. from the Birdsong Shale (Lower Devonian, middle Lochkovian) of Tennessee, USA, was an obligatory symbiont of the trepostome bryozoan Nakremella symbiotica n. gen. n. sp. Cladochonus sp. A and Cladochonus sp. B from the Givetian (Middle Devonian) of Sauerland, Germany, are intergrown with the cryptostome species Intrapora variabilis Ernst, 2008. This interrelation is interpreted to be obligatory for the coral and facultative for the bryozoan. The coral symbionts benefitted from the bryozoans due to the enhanced mechanical stabilisation and enhanced feeding, while the bryozoans benefitted from the provision of a substrate, access to the higher tiering (arborescent growth), and receiving protection from the corals.
Tabulipora Young, 1883 is one of the most characteristic Carboniferous–Permian bryozoan genera recorded worldwide. Numerous species of this genus show wide variety of morphology and size. However, several species are considered among the largest bryozoan forms, and this includes the Argentinean Tabulipora described in this contribution. The specimens are ramose forms reaching 15cm in maximum zoarial length and 2 cm in branch diameter. The fossil material comes from the Arizaro Formation, Puna region (Salta province) in north-western Argentina. This unit is separated in three members developed in a mixed carbonate-siliciclastic marine shelf palaeoenvironment. The record of abundant bryozoan specimens and a varied fauna of invertebrates including brachiopods, bivalves, crinoids, gastropods, ostracods, and benthic foraminifers are comparable to nearby basins in northern Chile (Cerro El Árbol, Cerros de Cuevitas and Juan de Morales formations), Bolivia and Peru (Copacabana Formation). All these basins have been included in the Andean bryozoan province which characterises an intermediate climatic latitudinal gradient from the equatorial to subtropical areas in Venezuela, Peru, and Bolivia to temperate conditions in northern Chile and Argentina. This gradient can be followed southward in southern Gondwana with the development of typical high-latitude bryozoan associations. The presence of giant taxa, such as Tabulipora, suggests a latitudinal effect on the size of these faunas.
Heliolitids (Heliolitina, Tabulata) are one of the few groups of Paleozoic corals exhibiting a plocoid form of the corallum, indicative of a relatively high level of colony integration. The difference in the spacing of individual corallites within their plocoid colonies (measured in corallites per cm2) has been broadly used as one of the main characteristics for distinguishing between heliolitid taxa. In the present study, corallite spacing was analysed in three coral species: Propora tubulata and Heliolites spongodes from the Silurian of Gotland, and H. porosus from the Devonian of Morocco. This study aims to offer a new perspective on the usefulness of corallite spacing in heliolitids as a characteristic for the purpose of taxonomic, palaeoecological, and evolutionary analyses. Additionally, a new measure of this trait, corallites per (10d)2, is proposed, in order to facilitate more direct comparisons of corallite spacing despite intra- and interspecific differences. Observations on P. tubulata and H. porosus show that their corallite spacing was adaptable. The adaptability of offset insertion in heliolitids was likely advantageous and could be the reason behind the evolutionary convergence between them and the modern octocoral Heliopora coerulea, which develops a very similar colony structure.
Francis Tourneur was born the 27th of February 1959 in Namur, Belgium and grew up in the town of Tamines in the Sambre valley. As he used to tell, he was raised by his grandmother who taught him to walk, to speak, to eat… and to drink! The Sambre valley was a place of stones, mines and quarries, which might explain his interest in geology. He came to the sciences at the university, starting his degree in sciences at the Facultés universitaires Notre-Dame de la Paix de Namur, then at the Université Catholique de Louvain where he graduated in Sciences géologiques et minéralogiques in 1981. His first scientific work for his master thesis was somewhat a combination of what his scientific career would then be: fossils and stratigraphy in Frasnian red marble bioherms.
This special volume of the Spanish Journal of Palaeontology, dedicated to Professor Francis Tourneur, brings together a series of contributions focused on tabulate and rugose corals, as well as coral palaeoecology—domains to which Francis devoted much of his distinguished and productive scientific career. As highlighted in the opening article, which presents a detailed biographical overview, his research encompassed an impressive breadth of palaeontological subjects. Nevertheless, throughout this wide-ranging scholarly trajectory, corals remained the consistent and unifying thread that shaped his scientific legacy.
The Tienne Sainte-Anne bioherms are small lens-like reefs developed in the upper part of the Eifelian along the southern margin of the Dinant Synclinorium in southern Belgium. They have a typical development pattern, starting on crinoidal gravel stabilised by lamellar stromatoporoids. This first stage provides a firm ground for the development of larger and thicker stromatoporoids that suggest growth in a shallow, turbulent and clear-water environment. A progressive deepening is recorded in the development of finer-grained sediment, culminating in what could be interpreted as a ‘micritic core’ with cavities and a peculiar fauna. The facies occupying most of the volume of the reefs is made of stromatoporoid framestone and boundstone passing laterally to accumulations of stromatoporoid, coral and crinoid debris. The top of the reef is dominated by massive stromatoporoids, together with large colonies of Heliolites and Cyathophyllum, which indicate shallow, agitated waters. With this last facies is associated the most diverse faunal assemblage of the reef. The shallowing-upwards trend recorded in the facies culminated with the emersion of the top of the bioherm, triggering its demise. The modest size and limited ecological development of the reefs are interpreted as a consequence of the emersion of the platform.
The oldest Ordovician rugose and tabulate corals recognised in the Brabant Massif (Belgium, Avalonia) have been systematically revised for the first time since they were first described in the 1870s. They are from three localities (Fauquez, Grand-Manil, Rebecq-Rognon) situated on the southern margin of this Caledonian massif and exposing the siliciclastic Huet Formation (early Katian). Specimens are decalcified and represented by external natural moulds precluding their study in thin section, as usually done, and not allowing precise and confident identifications. The numerous solitary rugose corals are ascribed to the lambelasmatid genus Rectigrewingkia, and the tabulate corals are doubtfully assigned to the coccoseridid genera Coccoseris and Acidolites. The corals from the Huet Formation form a poorly diverse association as is also the case of those reported in the Condroz Inlier, within the Bois de Presles Member (Fosses Formation) of middle to late Katian age (excluding those of the Cocriamont conglomerate).
Multiple types of mounds have been described in the Pennsylvanian of the Cantabrian Mountains. In many of them the main component is Donezella Maslov, 1929. This organism was first described as an alga, but its occurrence in dysphotic and aphotic facies led to its inclusion in the order Algospongia, which includes organisms of doubtful affinity. Most of the mounds with Donezella from the Cantabrian Mountains previously described in the San Emiliano, Valdeteja and Picos de Europa formations have been identified in ramp or slope facies in dysphotic or aphotic conditions, confirming that it was not an alga. However, mounds 1 to 2 metres thick and 3 to 5 metres in diameter have been located in outcrops near the town of Truébano. The main component is Donezella, but unlike other occurrences, these mounds also contain chaetetids and Girvanella as important components. The latter is considered to be a cyanobacteria and clearly indicative of shallow waters in the photic zone. Chaetetids are typical reef builders and frequent on Devonian and Carboniferous shallow platforms. In the studied mounds, chaetetids occur in association with Donezella, Girvanella, Masloviporidium, Claracrusta and other components, proving that these mounds developed in the photic zone, unlike those when the main component is Donezella.
Bioerosion is an ecological process identifiable in the fossil record by means of traces left on hard substrates by producers, since Late Proterozoic times. It implies both the destruction and construction of information, and its analysis is a valuable tool to better understand the biodiversity and the (palaeo)ecological complexity of a given area at any moment of the Earth’s history, as bioeroding organisms often lack a fossilisable hard skeleton. Moreover, bioerosion traces inform on two (reaction and coaction) of the three relationships established between organisms and their environment within the ecosystem. But bioerosion is also a first order taphonomic agent. Bioerosion and taphonomy follow one another as (palaeo)ecological and fossilisation processes, but at the same time they overlap and condition each other. This review aims to be a state-of-the-art treatise on bioerosion as both an ecological process and a taphonomic agent. The review mainly focuses on the fields of palaeomalacology, understanding molluscs both as producers and victims, or substrates of bioerosion, and of the rocky-shore environments, both centred in the Neogene period. Bioerosive studies of a palaeoecological and palaeoenvironmental nature are numerous and continue to increase. Research on bioerosion-taphonomy interaction still has a long way to go. As such, this contribution will demonstrate its value for both palaeoenvironmental interpretation and for understanding the sometimes-complex processes of fossilisation.
The phalangeal formula (PF) describes the skeletal configuration of the digital regions of the autopodia. The plesiomorphic phalangeal formula (PPF) for the Lepidosauria manus is 2-3-4-5-3. Previous research identified 53 unique PFs in lepidosaurians. Here, we propose a new analytical method treating the PF as a matrix, applying image processing techniques to analyze new organizational patterns including symmetry. We quantified the degree of symmetry of the 53 lepidosaurian PFs through a symmetry score capturing the overlap between the original images and their transformed counterparts after specific geometric operations. We found that the PPF revealed a previously unnoticed diagonal axis of symmetry, a pattern highly improbable compared to thousands of randomly generated PFs. In a PCA of the 53 lepidosaurian PFs symmetry scores, PC1 was significantly correlated with the total number of phalanges whereas PC2 reflected the variability in phalangeal counts among different digits. The PCA effectively summarized the underlying variance of the symmetry scores data, elucidating a reduction trend in phalanx count (PC1) and the degree of diversity of PF arrangements (PC2). This approach is useful for addressing symmetry in meristic characters and systems of articulated pieces which could reveal hidden symmetry patterns in other lineages.
This essay explores the relationship between artistic and scientific perspectives in the depiction of birds' formal organization. It highlights how both fields converge in fundamental questions that shape the identity of avian organisms. Historically, early approaches to avian evolution focused on functional characters, which represented complex adaptations. Birds were later linked to archosaurian reptiles from around 200 million years ago, and their evolution was seen as gradual, emerging from terrestrial organisms. Recent palaeontological discoveries, particularly from the Maniraptora group, have provided well-preserved fossils, supporting the theory that birds are descendants of dinosaurs. These findings suggest that the emergence of birds from their maniraptoriform ancestors occurred in less than 50 million years. Phylogenetic systematics has helped to map out evolutionary transformations based on homologous traits, but discrepancies in these patterns have led to inconsistencies in cladograms. Meanwhile, studies in morphometrics, genetics, and developmental biology have focused on morphological units, interpreting these units through the lens of modularity and evolutionary integration—concepts also explored in art—to understand the new avian Bauplan.
Se presenta una breve visión histórica del descubrimiento, estudio, interpretación y repercusión popular de la especie Megatherium americanum Cuvier, 1796 (Mammalia, Xenarthra, Megatheriidae), principalmente de dos esqueletos montados en España desde antiguo. El ejemplar exhibido en el Museo de Ciencias Naturales de Valencia (España), que forma parte de la colección traída por Rodrigo Botet en 1898 de Argentina, representa uno de los especímenes más completos y emblemáticos que se han recuperado de esta especie de la megafauna sudamericana del Pleistoceno. Este coloso terrestre, un herbívoro especializado, es conocido por su robustez ósea y requerimientos biomecánicos especiales para soportar su gran masa corporal. Varias investigaciones han demostrado su capacidad para adoptar posturas bípedas ocasionales, utilizando su cola y extremidades posteriores como soporte, lo que le permitía acceder a vegetación elevada. Además, su musculatura desarrollada y garras largas le facilitaban alcanzar recursos tróficos como raíces, por medio de actividades fosoriales, y brotes de ramas altas, y le servían para la defensa contra depredadores. Estudios recientes sobre su microestructura ósea han revelado una intensa remodelación, acorde con las demandas biomecánicas que se derivaban de su locomoción y tamaño. El espécimen presente en Valencia es un testimonio clave de los avances en paleontología, y continúa enriqueciendo nuestra comprensión biológica de la evolución de los Xenarthra.
Miquel De Renzi de la Fuente es un paleontólogo catalán que ha realizado gran parte de su investigación y magisterio en la Universitat de València, como catedrático de Paleontología. Es difícil indicar cuál de sus dos grandes facetas ha sido más importante, su investigación o su docencia. Son muchos los alumnos de Biología que quedaron marcados por sus clases en epistemología de la ciencia, biomorfodinámica y Paleontología, la última disciplina desde una visión muy biológica, pero a la vez profundamente multifacética. Son también muchos los doctorandos que aprendieron a investigar en esa ciencia que se ocupa de hechos naturales históricos y, por ello, contingentes. Actualmente, como Profesor Emérito de la Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas de la Universitat de València, actualmente con despacho y laboratorio en el Instituto Cavanilles de Biodiversidad y Biología Evolutiva, la comunidad española de paleontólogos, agrupados en la Sociedad Española de Paleontología, ha querido rendirle un homenaje publicando, en su honor, el volumen actual de su decana revista científica. La presente es una visión sobre su magisterio e investigación, sin olvidar el factor humano, en el cual destaca su generosidad para con sus alumnos y colegas, así como su permanente disponibilidad para iluminar cualquier aspecto de la investigación y de la disciplina. En conclusión, para sus colegas y para varias generaciones de alumnos y doctorandos, Miquel De Renzi es un sabio de eso tan complejo que es el proceso evolutivo y, además, un amigo.
