COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH: A Lower-to Middle-Jurassic Terrestrial Vertebrate Assemblage and Its Implications for the Post-Triassic Radiation of Tetrapods

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In this renewal, PIs will, in collaboration with Mexican colleagues, finish work on an interdisciplinary study of an early Jurassic assemblage of small fossil vertebrates from Huizachal Canyon, NE Mexico. These fossils represent a rare example of the apparently cosmopolitan, low-diversity fauna distributed throughout most of Pangaea after the end-Triassic extinction. Three lines of research to be completed are 1) study some newly discovered fossils, including skulls of a new sphenodontian, 2) collect and analyze pollen from appropriate localities, and 3) extend the stratigraphy into neighboring canyons to establish lithostratigraphic relationships of the fossil-bearing beds. Some additional geochemical analyses and radiometric dating will be conducted to help establish the age of these fossil-bearing strata.