A Mesozoic fossil lagerstätte from 250.8 million years ago shows a modern-type marine ecosystem.
Xu DaiJoshua F H L DaviesZhiwei YuanArnaud BrayardMaria OvtcharovaGuanghui XuXiaokang LiuChristopher P A SmithCarrie E SchweitzerMingtao LiMorgann G PerrotShouyi JiangLuyi MiaoYiran CaoJia YanRuoyu BaiFengyu WangWei GuoHuyue SongLi TianJacopo Dal CorsoYuting LiuDaoliang ChuHaijun SongPublished in: Science (New York, N.Y.) (2023)
Finely preserved fossil assemblages (lagerstätten) provide crucial insights into evolutionary innovations in deep time. We report an exceptionally preserved Early Triassic fossil assemblage, the Guiyang Biota, from the Daye Formation near Guiyang, South China. High-precision uranium-lead dating shows that the age of the Guiyang Biota is 250.83 +0.07/-0.06 million years ago. This is only 1.08 ± 0.08 million years after the severe Permian-Triassic mass extinction, and this assemblage therefore represents the oldest known Mesozoic lagerstätte found so far. The Guiyang Biota comprises at least 12 classes and 19 orders, including diverse fish fauna and malacostracans, revealing a trophically complex marine ecosystem. Therefore, this assemblage demonstrates the rapid rise of modern-type marine ecosystems after the Permian-Triassic mass extinction.