Lawrence J. Flynn - Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin
Here you can read online Lawrence J. Flynn - Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin full text of the book (entire story) in english for free. Download pdf and epub, get meaning, cover and reviews about this ebook. City: Dordrecht, publisher: Springer Netherlands, genre: Home and family. Description of the work, (preface) as well as reviews are available. Best literature library LitArk.com created for fans of good reading and offers a wide selection of genres:
Choose a favorite category and find really read worthwhile books. Enjoy immersion in the world of imagination, feel the emotions of the characters or learn something new for yourself, make an fascinating discovery.
Book:
Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin
Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin: summary, description and annotation
We offer to read an annotation, description, summary or preface (depends on what the author of the book "Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin" wrote himself). If you haven't found the necessary information about the book — write in the comments, we will try to find it.
Lawrence J. Flynn: author's other books
Who wrote Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin? Find out the surname, the name of the author of the book and a list of all author's works by series.
Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin — read online for free the complete book (whole text) full work
Below is the text of the book, divided by pages. System saving the place of the last page read, allows you to conveniently read the book "Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin" online for free, without having to search again every time where you left off. Put a bookmark, and you can go to the page where you finished reading at any time.
Lawrence J. Flynn and Wen-Yu Wu (eds.) Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: Geology and Fossil Mammals Vertebrate Paleobiology and Paleoanthropology 10.1007/978-94-024-1050-1_1
1. Small Mammal Exploration in Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province
Lawrence J. Flynn 1
(1)
Department of Human Evolutionary Biology, and the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
(2)
Laboratory of Paleomammalogy, Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 142 Xizhimenwai Ave., Beijing, 100044, Peoples Republic of China
Lawrence J. Flynn (Corresponding author)
Email:
Wen-Yu Wu
Email:
Abstract
Yushe Basin is an intermontane basin at the eastern edge of the Loess Plateau in northern China. Its fluvial, lake and superposed loess deposits accumulated during the last 7 myr and contain many fossiliferous horizons. Small mammal fossils occur throughout, and some fossil horizons produce diverse assemblages that appear to faithfully represent the micromammal component of Yushe paleocommunities. Yushe Basin includes assemblages that represent the late Baodean age (latest Miocene) microfaunas of North China , and document contrasting younger assemblages that characterize a distinct Pliocene Yushe chronofauna . Pliocene fossils represent two successive microfaunas that distinguish the Gaozhuangian and Mazegouan land mammal stage/ages. These are in turn distinct from the Pleistocene assemblages of Yushe that correlate with Nihe wan and later faunas. The Sino-American project, especially in the interval of 19871991, developed the small mammal biostratigraphy of the Yuncu subbasin of Yushe Basin. Small mammal fossils occur in every Yuncu formation, from the Baodean age Mahui Formation, through the Pliocene Gaozhuang and Mazegou formations, to the early Pleistocene Haiyan Formation. Important elements of later Pleistocene faunas occur in overlying loess. Field teams collected specimens exposed on eroded surfaces and followed indications of small mammal concentrations to excavate bulk samples and process them for fossils by wet screening. Wet screening revealed a rich component of micromammal diversity to complement the wealth of larger species that previously had been known as surface finds.
Keywords
Yushe Basin Late Neogene Biochronology Small mammals North China Screen Wash
1.1 Introduction
The history of scientific exploration of Yushe Basin over the last century was chronicled in Chap. 2, Volume I, of the Springer series Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: Geology and Fossil Mammals . Fossils from Yushe Basin have been known for nearly 100 years, and exploration culminated in the late 20th century in a joint Sino-American expedition led by members of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Academia Sinica , (IVPP) and the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) . Important fossil sites had been found in the first half of the 20th century throughout Shanxi Province in North China (Fig. ). The physical setting for fluvial and lacustrine deposition of the Late Neogene formations of Yushe in basins underlain by Triassic age bedrock was described in Volume I, Chapter 3.
Fig. 1.1
Location of Shanxi Province within North China , indicating important fossil-producing regions: Baode, Shouyang , Yushe, and Wuxiang . Artwork by Frank Ippolito (AMNH) adapted from Fig. 1.1 of Volume I of this series
Since the 1930s, special attention was given to the small mammal fossils preserved in the formations of Yushe Basin. Paleontologists Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and C.C. Young () completed a monographic treatment of larger body size rodents that were well represented as fossils. Young embarked on a long career of study of small mammal fossils that in repeated instances influences the modern interpretation of Yushe microfaunas, as will be seen in the following chapters. Young (Chungchien Young, Zhong-Jian Yang) may be seen as the father of modern vertebrate paleontology in China.
Fossils were entombed throughout the deposits of Yushe Basin, so that superposed assemblages today represent successive samples of past biotas. The sediments were mainly gravels, sands and silts that accumulated to an aggregate thickness of about 800 m, and the entire series was blanketed by loess . Given generally limited cementation, fossils that accumulate on modern surface exposures due to erosion can be extracted easily from adhering matrix. The dating of Yushe sediments was presented in Chap. 4 of Volume I (Opdyke et al. ).
The modern epoch of research on Yushe Basin faunas began in 1978 when Zhan-Xiang Qiu and IVPP began stratigraphically controlled reconnaissance. It was clear (Qiu ac). Stratigraphic provenance was carefully controlled for each locality, which was numbered in sequence of study and given a prefix YS for Yushe site. The present volume focuses on the micromammal component of the fossils produced from Yushe.
Fig. 1.2
a c . Geological maps of Yushe subbasins prepared by the Sino-American mapping teams (19871998), showing lithostratigraphy, structure, and fossil localities. Figure 1.2a, formations exposed in Yuncu subbasin. Figure 1.2b, the northern Yushe subbasins (Nihe-Ouniwa area) and northern part of the Tancun subbasin. Figure 1.2c, most of the Tancun subbasin and lower Yuncu subbasin deposits on opposite sides of the Zhuozhang River. Maps by Frank Ippolito (AMNH) adapted to illustrate the distribution of small mammal localities
1.2 Small Mammal Recovery
Through most of the 20th century, Yushe small mammals appeared in field collections that had been retrieved as surface finds (Teilhard de Chardin ). These fossils represented mainly large body-size species of rabbits, beavers, bamboo rats, and zokors (the latter, an evolutionary radiation of subterranean muroids endemic to northeastern Asia). Such surface finds were comparable to those of large mammals found while prospecting: opportunistic finds, usually of single individuals. However, there was a strong bias against representation among fossils of small-body size. Today, important specimens are still found by prospecting, as by current field teams supported by the Yushe County Museum .
A fundamentally different approach for collecting small mammals was introduced to Yushe Basin in 1987 when the Sino-American group began a campaign of wet-screening productive sites. Figure ).
Fig. 1.3
Wen-Yu Wu collecting bulk samples of sediment for screening near Beimahui, utilizing one of the methods of hauling tons of material (Photo by L. Flynn, Sept. 1987)
Similar books «Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin»
Look at similar books to Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin. We have selected literature similar in name and meaning in the hope of providing readers with more options to find new, interesting, not yet read works.
Reviews about «Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin»
Discussion, reviews of the book Late Cenozoic Yushe Basin, Shanxi Province, China: geology and fossil mammals. Volume II, Small mammal fossils of Yushe Basin and just readers' own opinions. Leave your comments, write what you think about the work, its meaning or the main characters. Specify what exactly you liked and what you didn't like, and why you think so.
