Core value of the Chengjiang fauna:formation of the animal kingdom and the birth of basic human organs

Well known for its abundant and extraordinary soft-tissue fossils,the Chengjiang fauna has witnessed the main phase of the Cambrian explosion and the first great congress of the ancestors of nearly all major phyla of animals on Earth.The large-scale survey and exploration of the fauna by Chinese paleontologists,partly in collaboration with international scientists,over the past 30 years can be broadly divided into three stages.In the first decade since 1984(19841994),a large number of invertebrates,including basal animals and the protostomes of the early animal tree were discovered,but the subkingdom Deuterostomia was completely unknown.Then in the second decade(19952005),the great discoveries of various deuterostomes led to the construction of the basic framework of the Deuterostomia and then to the formation of the tripartite phylogenetic trees of early animals(TPTEA,including basal animals,protostomes and deuterostomes),for the first time.In the third decade(after 2005),the academic community began to think about the internal relationships between the formation of TPTEA and the multiepisode Cambrian explosion,leading to the new hypothesis of the three-episode Cambrian explosion.The Chengjiang fauna is important for deciphering the fauna structure,paleoecological environment,and so on.However,its core academic values mainly rest on two aspects.Firstly,The Chengjiang fauna,as the main phase witness of the Cambrian explosion,has created a nearly complete phylogenetic framework of the TPTEA on Earth for the first time.The three-phase radiation hypothesis reveals the essential connotation of the Cambrian explosion:a step-wise divergent evolution of animals,from basal to highly advanced groups,lasting about 40 million years.In the first phase,it gave birth to a bulk of basal animals(including some now extinct“animal”groups)in the latest Ediacaran,probably including some pioneer protostomes.The second phase took place in the first epoch of the Cambrian period(Terreneuvian),giving rise to the main invertebrate protostomes with a persistent prosperity of basal animals.The third phase proceeded in Cambrian Epoch 2(represented by the Chengjiang fauna),which not only maintained the prosperity of basal animals and protostomes,but also,more importantly,gave birth to all the main phyla of the subkingdom Deuterostomia.Thus,the rudimental framework of the whole TPTEA has been shaped,with the termination of the major innovation events of the Cambrian explosion.Here,we discussed the evolutionary properties of Ediacaran biota,small shelly fossils and the Chengjiang fauna in the Cambrian explosion with emphasis on the biological properties of several important animal groups.The order Myllokunmingiida is the only known oldest vertebrate,while Yunnanozoon and Haikouella are neither vertebrates nor stem-group chordates but a special group of basal deuterostomes;Cheungkongella is a credible ancestor of the urochordate and it supports the classical hypothesis on the origin of the urochordates;and the gill slits were first invented in the members of the phylum Vetulicolia to provide key information on the origin of the deuterostomes.The second core value of the Chengjiang fauna is of profound humanistic and philosophical significance:the discoveries of the‘first gill openings’,‘first brain’,‘first vertebrae’and‘first heart’provide the pivotal evidence for solving the unsolved mystery of the origin of the main basic human organs as described in Darwin’s“The Descent of Man”.In addition,the morphological and anatomical information of the Chengjiang fauna can provide important clues for a better understanding of most components of Ediacaran and Cambrian metazoans.

The redox structure of Ediacaran and early Cambrian oceans and its controls

The rapid diversification of early animals during the Ediacaran(635–541 Ma) and early Cambrian(ca.541–509 Ma) has frequently been attributed to increasing oceanic oxygenation. However, the pattern of oceanic oxygenation and its relationship to early animal evolution remain in debate. In this review,we examine the redox structure of Ediacaran and early Cambrian oceans and its controls, offering new insights into contemporaneous oceanic oxygenation patterns and their role in the coevolution of environments and early animals. We review the development of marine redox models which, in combination with independent distal deep-ocean redox proxies, supports a highly redox-stratified shelf and an anoxia-dominated deep ocean during the Ediacaran and early Cambrian. Geochemical and modeling evidence indicates that the marine redox structure was likely controlled by low atmospheric O2 levels and low seawater vertical mixing rates on shelves at that time. Furthermore, theoretical analysis and increasing geochemical evidence, particularly from South China, show that limited sulfate availability was a primary control on the attenuation of mid-depth euxinia offshore, in contrast to the existing paradigm invoking decreased organic carbon fluxes distally. In light of our review, we infer that if oceanic oxygenation indeed triggered the rise of early animals, it must have done so through a shelf oxygenation which was probably driven by elevated oxidant availability. Our review calls for further studies on EdiacaranCambrian marine redox structure and its controls, particularly from regions outside of South China, in order to better understand the coevolutionary relationship between oceanic redox and early animals.

THE ANIMAL BONES FROM A FURTHER GROUP OF EARLY BRONZE AGE PITS AT OSTIANO, S. SALVATORE (Cremona)

The faunal remains from a group of pits excavated at Ostiano, S. Salvatore (Cremona- Northern Italy) are represented by bones of cattle, sheep/goat, pig and hare. Together with the archaeo-botanical and archaeological data, they reveal a well balanced, mixed subsistence strategy, combiningcereal agriculture and stock raising, adapted to the geographical and environmental location of this EarlyBronze Age settlement. I resti faunistici di un altro gruppo di pozzetti del sito del Bronzo antico di Ostiano,S. Salvatore (Cremona). I reperti faunistici di Ostiano, S. Salvatore sono rappresentati da resti di bovini,capra/pecora, maiale e lepre. Unitamente ai reperti archeobotanici ed archeologici, questi docmnentanouna strategia di sussistenza ben bilanciata fra allevamento ed agricoltura che concorda con la localizza-zione geografico-ambientale del sito dell’età del Bronzo antica.