SGER: A New Triassic Plant Locality in Northern China with Gondwanan Affinities

SGER：中国北方与冈瓦纳大陆有亲缘关系的新三叠纪植物产地

• 批准号: 0749139
• 负责人: Nicholas Fraser
• 金额: $ 1.14万
• 依托单位: Virginia Museum of Natural History Foundation
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2007-09-15 至 2008-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0749139&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: SGER; New; Triassic; Plant; Locality

The end Triassic is an important interval in the evolution of terrestrial ecosystems with a major shift from "archaic" faunas and floras to those with a distinct modern aspect. To date the terrestrial Triassic of Liaoning Province has received little attention and there have only been a handful of publications on its plant fossils. Earlier this year the PIs conducted substantial field work in the Yangcaogou Formation yielding some of the most complete and significant plant macrofossils known from the Triassic. Spectacular specimens of ferns, cycadophytes and sphenophytes are providing completely new insights into their growth habits. At the end of the field season the PIs discovered a layer with abundant remains of unequivocal Umkomasia - the female reproductive axis of corystosperms. Corystosperms are almost exclusively confined to Gondwana and this is the first record in Asia. Perhaps just as significantly the new locality offers an excellent opportunity to collect articulated remains of corystosperms. It is therefore vital that this new locality is subjected to intensive excavation. There is, however, some degree of urgency to this work as the local farmers have been illegally collecting from the area, selling the fossils to dealers. Indeed they have already dug through part of the main Umkomasia-producing beds to reach larger specimens of sphenophytes which they have then crudely cut out of the rock. The proposed work will include a large excavation of the Umkomasia beds. All collected material will be shipped to the US for preparation and study. Undergraduate and graduate students will be involved in this work at the University of South Alabama, and an exhibit featuring the material will be developed at the Virginia Museum of Natural History in conjunction with the National Geological Museum of China (GMC) in Beijing. Eventually all collected material will be housed at GMC.

三叠纪末是陆地生态系统演化的一个重要时期，其主要转变是从“古老”的动物群和植物群转向具有明显现代特征的动物群和植物群。迄今为止，辽宁省陆相三叠系的研究很少，有关其植物化石的报道也不多。今年早些时候，PI在羊草沟组进行了大量的野外工作，获得了一些三叠纪最完整和最重要的植物宏体化石。壮观的蕨类植物，苏铁植物和蝶形植物标本提供了全新的见解，他们的生长习性。在野外季节结束时，PI发现了一层具有丰富的明确Umkomasia遗迹-Corystosperms的雌性生殖轴。Corystosperms几乎完全局限于冈瓦纳，这是亚洲的第一个记录。也许同样重要的是，新地点提供了一个极好的机会来收集连接的珊瑚虫遗骸。因此，对这个新地点进行深入挖掘至关重要。然而，这项工作有一定的紧迫性，因为当地农民一直在非法收集该地区的化石，并将其出售给经销商。 事实上，他们已经挖通了部分主要的乌姆科马西亚生产床，以达到更大的标本，然后他们粗略地从岩石中切割出来。拟议的工作将包括对Umkomasia层进行大规模挖掘。所有收集的材料将被运往美国进行准备和研究。南亚拉巴马大学的本科生和研究生将参与这项工作，弗吉尼亚自然历史博物馆将与北京的中国国家地质博物馆（GMC）合作举办一个以这些材料为特色的展览。最终，所有收集的材料将存放在GMC。