A new red alga preserved with possible reproductive bodies from the 518-million-year-old Qingjiang biota |
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Authors: | Rui-Yun Li Lin-Hao Cui Dong-Jing Fu Xing-Liang Zhang |
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Institution: | State Key Laboratory of Continental Dynamics, Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Early Life and Environments, Department of Geology, Northwest University, Xi'an, 710069 China |
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Abstract: | Macroalgae have been a key ecological component of marine ecosystems since the Proterozoic period and are common fossil forms in Cambrian Burgess Shale-type Lagerstätten. However, in most cases, it is difficult to place these early fossil algae into modern groups because little distinctive morphology is preserved. Here, we describe a new form of macroalgae, Qingjiangthallus cystocarpium gen. & sp. nov., from the Qingjiang biota of South China. The new taxon is represented by 546 specimens remarkably preserved with characteristics that allow a phylogenetic placement into crown groups of red algae. Centimeter-sized thalli resemble members of the extant Rhodymeniophycidae (a subclass of the class Florideophyceae), and hence suggest a florideophycean affinity, which indicates that ahnfeltiophycidaen and rhodymeniophycidaen algae may have diverged at least 518 Ma, accordant with estimations of molecular studies. The presence of possible cystocarps on Qingjiangthallus thalli suggests that evolutionary innovation of a triphasic life cycle in red algae may have occurred no later than the Early Cambrian. The branching patterns and branch width of Qingjiangthallus are consistent with the coarsely dichotomously branched morphogroup, which was previously present in the Ediacaran, Ordovician, and afterward, but absent in the Cambrian. |
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Keywords: | reproductive structure Cambrian evolutionary innovation macroalgae Qingjiang biota Qingjiangthallus |
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