Important Fossil Deposits

Question 1

Istaq Gneiss (Isua Green Belt)

Answer 1

3.75 Ga, oldest sedimentary rocks, possibly oldest life but the radiometric isotopes could be from other sources not only life

Question 2

Moodies group

Answer 2

3.2 Ga, first convincing body fossils of acritarchs

Question 3

Changzhougou and Chuanlinggou Formations

Answer 3

1.6 - 1.8 Ga, first eukaryotic (single-celled) organisms in arcitarchs

Question 4

Transvaal Supergroup

Answer 4

2.52 Ga, oldest diverse assemblage

Question 5

Hunting Formation

Answer 5

1.2 Ga, oldest multicellular eukaryotes

Question 6

Apex Churt

Answer 6

~3.5 Ga, oldest putative fossils (cyanobacteria arcitarchs?)

Question 7

Huqf Supergroup

Answer 7

715-635 Ma, oldest animal records

Question 8

Fifteenmile Group

Answer 8

712-812 Ma, oldest microfossil biomineralization

Question 9

Lantian Biota

Answer 9

630-615 Ma, complex, macroscopic, multicellular eukaryotes like multicellular algea, cnidarians, worm-like animals

Question 10

Doushantou Formations

Answer 10

630-550 Ma, carbon, silicon, and phosphate preservation windows of early multicellular eukaryotes

Question 11

Avalon Assemblage

Answer 11

580-560 Ma, Ediacaran Biota, underwater avalanching event of the sediments

Question 12

White Sea Assemblage

Answer 12

555-515 Ma, Ediacaran Biota, shallower seafloor organisms from continental shelf, a lot of sandstone, dicksonia, tubelike fossils, earliest borrow trace fossils

Question 13

Nama Assemblage

Answer 13

545-541 Ma, mass flow of sandstone, pteridinium (example of segmented organism)

Question 14

Burgess Shale Biota

Answer 14

505 Ma, Cambrian ecosystem of seafloor

Question 15

Chengjiang Biota

Answer 15

518 Ma, another shale deposit like the Burgess Shale, also called Maotianshan Shales