The La Voulte-sur-Rhône Lagerstätte (Middle Jurassic,France)

The La Voulte Lagerstätte (Jurassic, France) is characterized by a diverse and exceptionally well-preserved fauna. It was located along the western Tethyan margin where the submarine relief was steep. The sedimentation was dominated by marls suggesting a low energy and deep-water depositional environment. The La Voulte biota is remarkable for its biodiversity with about 60 different species. The major components are the arthropods (50% of the species), the cephalopods (10%) and the echinoderms (10%). Among the arthropods, the composition and some anatomical features suggest a relatively deep-water environment characterized by dim-light conditions. The cephalopods and other organisms (pycnogonids, asterids), have extant analogues that all live in deep-water niches always exceeding 200 m. The fauna as a whole bears the characteristic features of the present-day bathyal fauna. The La Voulte Lagerstätte may be one of the rare Jurassic Lagerstätten, if not the unique, to have fossilized a deep marine fauna.     

Araucariaceae (Pinopsida): Aspects in palaeobiogeography and palaeobiodiversity in the Mesozoic

The paper examines recent information on the history of the ‘southern hemisphere’ conifer family Araucariaceae and gives supplementary notes to previously published monographs. Important data from the Mesozoic fossil record are presented and summarized to describe the ancient diversity and distribution of Araucariaceae. Information on the origin of the family and oldest fossil records of the present-day genera are assembled. Existing models on phylogenetic relationships within the family inferred from molecular data are compared with relationships between the genera determined from morphological data. Reasons for disappearance of representatives of this conifer family in the latest Cretaceous in North America and Europe are briefly discussed.     

Cenozoic plant diversity of Yunnan: A review

Yunnan in southwestern China is renowned for its high plant diversity. To understand how this modern botanical richness formed, it is critical to investigate the past biodiversity throughout the geological time. In this review, we present a summary on plant diversity, floristics and climates in the Cenozoic of Yunnan and document their changes, by compiling published palaeobotanical sources. Our review demonstrates that thus far a total of 386 fossil species of ferns, gymnosperms and angiosperms belonging to 170 genera within 66 families have been reported from the Cenozoic, particularly the Neogene, of Yunnan. Angiosperms display the highest richness represented by 353 species grouped into 155 genera within 60 families, with Fagaceae, Fabaceae, Lauraceae and Juglandaceae being the most diversified. Most of the families and genera recorded as fossils still occur in Yunnan, but seven genera have disappeared, including Berryophyllum, Cedrelospermum, Cedrus, Palaeocarya, Podocarpium, Sequoia and Wataria. The regional extinction of these genera is commonly referred to an aridification of the dry season associated with Asian monsoon development. Floristic analyses indicate that in the late Miocene, Yunnan had three floristic regions: a northern subtropical floristic region in the northeast, a subtropical floristic region in the east, and a tropical floristic region in the southwest. In the late Pliocene, Yunnan saw two kinds of floristic regions: a subalpine floristic region in the northwest, and two subtropical floristic regions separately in the southwest and the eastern center. These floristic concepts are verified by results from our areal type analyses which suggest that in the Miocene southwestern Yunnan supported the most Pantropic elements, while in the Pliocene southwestern Yunnan had abundant Tropical Asia (Indo–Malaysia) type and East Asia and North America disjunct type that were absent from northwestern Yunnan. From the late Miocene to late Pliocene through to the present, floristic composition and vegetation types changed markedly, presumably in response to altitude changes and coeval global cooling. An integration of palaeoclimate data suggests that during the Neogene Yunnan was warmer and wetter than today. Moreover, northern Yunnan witnessed a pronounced temperature decline, while southern Yunnan experienced only moderate temperature changes. Summer precipitation was consistently higher than winter precipitation, suggesting a rainfall seasonality. This summary on palaeoclimates helps us to understand under what conditions plant diversity occurred and evolved in Yunnan throughout the Cenozoic.     

The uppermost Oligocene of Aix-en-Provence (Bouches-du-Rhône,Southern France): A Cenozoic brackish subtropical Konservat-Lagerstätte,with fishes,insects and plants

Aix-en-Provence is one of the most famous localities for Cenozoic fossils in Europe, known since the end of the 18th century for the exquisitely preserved fishes, insects and plant remains extracted from laminated deposits exposed in the underground quarries developed for the exploitation of the gypsum, and in some sites located inside and around the city. The Aix-en-Provence fossil assemblage includes a considerable variety of organisms that provide a well-documented evidence of the existence of a large subtropical brackish (primarily oligohaline) lagoon temporarily connected to the sea in southern France during the latest Oligocene.