490-Million-Year-Old Arthropod Fossil Fills Puzzling Gap in Fossil Record

A new species of corcoraniid arthropod that lived during the Furongian epoch, between 497 and 487 million years ago, has been identified from an exceptionally preserved specimen found near Québec, Canada. The discovery supports the view that the so-called Furongian Gap — an evolutionary interval between the Cambrian Explosion and the Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event characterized by a marked drop in biodiversity — partly reflects sampling bias, rather than true biodiversity decline.

490-Million-Year-Old Arthropod Fossil Fills Puzzling Gap in Fossil Record. A new species of corcoraniid arthropod that lived during the Furongian epoch, between 497 and 487 million years ago, has been identified from an exceptionally preserved specimen found near Québec, Canada. The discovery supports the view that the so-called Furongian Gap — an evolutionary interval between the Cambrian Explosion and the Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event characterized by a marked drop in biodiversity — partly reflects sampling bias, rather than true biodiversity decline. Life reconstruction of Magnicornaspis garwoodi. Image credit: Thomas Turner. “Paleontologists have wondered whether this time of markedly less diversity of life could be linked to ocean chemistry, cooling climates or environmental instability,” said Flinders University’s Dr. Ru...