COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH: A Remarkable New Fossil Assemblage from the Burgess Shale at Marble Canyon, Kootenay National Park

寒武纪？爆炸？是地球生命史上的一件奇事。这段经历见证了几乎所有主要动物类群(门)的起源和迅速多样化，将整个地质记录分为两部分，前寒武纪和显生宙。到目前为止，关于这一事件的最好记录来自少数特殊的化石沉积物，这些沉积物保存了通常不会在化石记录中留下痕迹的生物的软的、非生物矿化的组织。这些沉积物不仅提供了早期进化模式的非凡视角，而且有助于揭示动物族谱的基本结构。最近，据报道，在大理石峡谷附近的伯吉斯页岩中发现了数十年来最重要的寒武纪化石组合。该项目寻求通过多学科方法提供新化石组合及其地质和地球化学背景的基线特征，这将为本科生和博士后学者提供实践培训。该项目的目标是：1.通过勘探和采石记录新化石动物群的地理范围和组成；2.利用地球化学和沉积学方法重建这些化石组合蓬勃发展的古代环境的性质；3.开发相对时间内连接所有伯吉斯页岩地区的锶同位素年代学；以及4.确定大教堂断裂带的起源，这是一个神秘的地形特征，对伯吉斯页岩的地质史至关重要。

The Cambrian ?explosion? was a singular event in the history of life on Earth. This episode, which saw the origin and rapid diversification of almost all major groups of animals (phyla), serves to divide the entire geologic record into two parts, the Precambrian and Phanerozoic Eons. By far, the best records of this event come from a handful of exceptional fossil deposits that preserve the ?soft?, non-biomineralized tissues of organisms that normally leave no trace in the fossil record. Such deposits offer not only a remarkable view of the early patterns of evolution, but have helped to reveal the basic structure of the animal family tree. Recently, the most important Cambrian fossil assemblage discovered in decades was reported from the Burgess Shale near Marble Canyon. This project seeks to provide baseline characterization of the new fossil assemblage and its geological and geochemical context though a multi-disciplinary approach, which will provide hands on training for undergraduates and a postdoctoral scholar. The goals of the project are: 1. to document the geographic extent and composition of the new fossil fauna by exploration and quarrying; 2. to use geochemical and sedimentologic methods to reconstruct the nature of ancient environments in which these fossil assemblages thrived; 3. to develop a strontium isotope chronology linking all Burgess Shale localities in relative time, and; 4. to determine the origin of the Cathedral Escarpment, an enigmatic topographic feature that is central to the Geologic history of the Burgess Shale.