Among Polychaete annelids, calcareous tubes occur in Serpulidae, Spirorbidae, Sabellidae, and Cirratulidae (Perkins, 1991; Fischer et al., 2000). The tubes of most serpulids are completely or partially cemented to the substrate. The fossil genus Rotularia has a peculiar unattached, spirally coiled tube, thus well distinguishable from the other known serpulids. Tube records of Rotularia are known from Mesozoic (Late Jurassic) (Ball, 1960; Stevens, 1967) to Early Tertiary sediments, becoming very common during the Cretaceous and Eocene (see Savazzi, 1995). It also has a global distribution (Wrigley, 1951; Ball, 1960; Keen, 1961; Regenhardt, 1961; Howell, 1962; Stevens, 1967; Chiplonkar and Tapaswi, 1973; Ware, 1975; Lommerzheim, 1979; Macellari, 1984; Jäger, 1993).

The examination of 730 borings within 88 brachiopod hosts form the Middle Devonian of central New York State revealed four ichnospecies belonging to three ichnogenera that have taxonomic histories riddled with confusion, controversy and contradiction. New observations of the ichnotaxa question long-held views of a simple morphologic differentiation between sponge borings and worm borings. Clionoides Fenton and Fenton, 1932 is here considered a sponge boring, which is comprised of a complex, multi-dimensional system of tunnels, shafts, canals, microterraced bowl-shaped structures and cone extensions, and is a senior synonym of Paleosabella (McCoy 1855) and Vermiforichnus Cameron, 1969a. Clionolithes Clarke, 1908 is a sponge boring possessing a rosette, branching network extending from a central node and is a senior synonym of Nododendrina Vogel et al., 1987 and Ramodendrina Vogel et al., 1987. The creation of Canaliparva circularis n. ichnogen. n. ichnosp. is needed to accommodate simple, vertically oriented, U-shaped tunnels that are indicative of worm activity. Paleoecologic evidence supports a commensal relationship between the endoliths and hosts based upon boring site frequencies in the hosts, boring patterns and five inter-specific co-occurrences between traces. These new data suggest greater diversity and ecologic complexity in ichnofaunal paleocommunities from the Middle Devonian than previously recognized.

The problematic calcified cnidarian Cambroctoconus is described from the Henson Gletscher Formation (Cambrian Series 2, Stage 4–Series 3, Stage 5) of North Greenland, representing the first record from Laurentia of a genus otherwise recently described from China, Kyrgyzstan, and Korea. Internal molds produced by penetrative phosphatization mirror the pervasive pore system of the calice walls and septa. The pore system is compared to the network of gastrodermal solenia that distributes nutrients between polyps and surrounding stolon tissues in present day octocorals. In conjunction with the octagonal form of the individual coralla and eight-fold symmetry of septa, the pore system promotes assignment of Cambroctoconus to the Octocorallia, a basal clade in cnidarian phylogeny. Octocorals (‘soft corals’) are diverse in present day seas, but have a poor fossil record despite the general development of distinctive calcareous spicules. New taxa: Order Cambroctoconida new; Cambroctoconus koori new species.

New fossil material of Auliscomys formosus Reig 1978 allows restudy of the oldest known South American representative of the subfamily Sigmodontinae. Description of Auliscomys formosus was based on a fragmentary dentary exhumed from the Monte Hermoso Formation of central Argentina. Previous studies allocated A. formosus to the early Pliocene. A reevaluation of dental and cranial morphology, including for the first time the upper dentition, and the inclusion of A. formosus in a phylogenetic analysis of the tribe Phyllotini indicate that A. formosus represents a new genus, Kraglievichimys. Kraglievichimys shares a mosaic of characters with the living Auliscomys Osgood, 1915 and Loxodontomys Osgood, 1947. The taxonomic reassignment of A. formosus and the possibility that the Monte Hermoso Formation may be younger than early Pliocene in age provide a new understanding of cricetid diversification in South America. Estimates of sigmodontine ancestry by molecular approaches are biased toward older ages, whereas this new interpretation of the history of K. formosus suggests that the South American history of sigmodontines spans less than 4 million years.

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The genus Rhopalocystis (Eocrinoidea, Blastozoa) is characterized by both a short stratigraphic range (Fezouata Shale, middle Tremadocian to middle Floian, Lower Ordovician) and a reduced geographic extension (Agdz-Zagora area, central Anti-Atlas, Morocco). Since the original description of its type species (R. destombesi Ubaghs, 1963), three successive revisions of the genus Rhopalocystis have led to the erection of nine additional species. The morphological disparity within this genus is here critically reassessed on the basis of both historical material and new recently collected samples. The detailed examination of all specimens, coupled with morphometric and cladistic analyses, points toward a relatively strong support for five morphotypes. A systematic revision of Rhopalocystis is thus suggested, with only five valid taxa: R. destombesi, R. fraga Chauvel, 1971, R. grandis Chauvel, 1971, R. havliceki Chauvel, 1978, and R. zagoraensis Chauvel, 1971. The five others are considered as junior synonyms (R. dehirensis Chauvel and Régnault, 1986, R. lehmani Chauvel and Régnault, 1986, R. sp. A, R. sp. B, and R. sp. C).

Specimens of the ostracode species Puriana pacifica Benson, 1959, from a modern assemblage from the Gulf of California can be sorted by visual inspection into five groups based on taphonomic condition. Characteristics used for sorting include: presence or absence of appendages; color and opacity of the valves; and evidence of abrasion, fragmentation, and boring. As measured by resistance to crushing force, members of the five groups show appreciable, progressive, postmortem weakening so that specimens in the poorest apparent condition are the weakest mechanically. The groups also differ in style of fracturing in response to crushing force. Fractures of valves of the freshest specimens are located quite consistently. Among specimens with progressively more damage, the location of fractures becomes less predictable. On valves of the most damaged specimens, typical fractures are short and likely to occur almost anywhere on the valve. These experimental results emphasize the importance of rapid burial in enhancing the likelihood of fossilization. Furthermore, they cast doubt on the ability of paleoecologists to use valves and carapaces of fossil ostracodes to interpret levels of wave and current energy in ancient environments because taphonomic weakening and subsequent destruction may effectively mask functional morphology.

All aspects of stromatolites can be quantified, encompassing morphologic, dimensional, material, and positional attributes. Numerical data obtained by electronic image analysis or otherwise can facilitate taxonomy, classification, and studies of evolutionary tendencies in stromatolites, and bridge the language barriers as well. Consensus on basic attributes for recognizing taxa at different levels of hierarchy still needs to be developed; quantitative data can promote reduction or elimination of disagreements.

Chama iudicai n. sp. is described from the Pleistocene of San Antonio Oeste, Rio Negro Province, Argentina. It is characterized by its large size, thick shell, and crenulated inner margin. Externally it has weak comarginal lamellae. It is indicative of a clear, stenohaline, warm-water environment. This is the first record for the family Chamidae in the Argentine Quaternary.

An assemblage of well-preserved octocoral holdfasts and sclerites has been collected from the Red Bluff Formation at the Chickasawhay River, Wayne County, Mississippi. Seven families were identified, utilizing a collection of approximately 1,000 sclerites. Families represented are Telestidae, Nephtheidae, Anthothelidae, Paramuriceidae, Plexauridae, Virgulariidae, and Gorgoniidae. These families, with exception of the Gorgoniidae, are here reported for the first time as fossils from the Gulf Coast region. The collection represents one of the most diverse fossil octocoral assemblages known from a single location.

Twenty-eight specimens of well-preserved macrurous decapod crustaceans, collected from the Lopez de Bertodano and Sobral Formations on Seymour Island, Antarctic Peninsula, form the basis for description of Metanephrops jenkinsi n. sp. Based upon associated cephalopods, foraminiferans, and palynomorphs, the age of the occurrences ranges from Maastrichtian to Paleocene. The discovery extends the range of the genus from the Pliocene into the Cretaceous and extends the southern limit of the geographic extent of the genus from New Zealand to Antarctica.

Beremendiini is an extinct group of soricine shrews that were widely distributed during the Pliocene and Pleistocene. Their occurrence in China has been investigated, but their presence in northern Asian regions has remained poorly studied. This paper analyzes 56 fossil remains of Beremendiini collected from 16 early Pliocene to early Pleistocene localities in Russia (Siberia), Kazakhstan, and Mongolia and shows the presence of two beremendiin species: Beremendia fissidens (Petényi, 1864) and Beremendia minor Rzebik-Kowalska, 1976. Northern Asian Beremendia considerably vary in size and qualitative characteristics, although most of the different states have been identified in European or Chinese specimens. Through the application of geometric morphometric techniques, mandibular shape analyses reveal similarities between the members of the beremendiin genera Peisorex Kowalski and Li, 1963, Beremendia Kormos, 1934, and Lunanosorex Jin and Kawamura, 1996. Shape analyses and comparisons of mandibular characteristics reveal ‘trophic’ analogies between Beremendia and Blarina spp. and a new model of ‘Mandible Swinging and Sliding’ (MSS-model) accounting for the similarities in mandibular morphology with implications for the understanding of the diet of Beremendia.

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The crustacean coprolite Favreina prima n. sp. and its internal structure are described from an upper Frasnian–lowermost Famennian limestone clast of moderately deep water origin, which derived from an Upper Carboniferous conglomerate of the Rif Mountains, northern Morocco. The fecal pellets were produced by early decapods that may be related to the Palaeopalaemonidae. Foraminifers of the stratigraphic marker genus Eonodosaria are associated with the coprolite. This is the third report of Paleozoic crustacean coprolites and the first occurrence prior to the Lower Permian.

The dramatic late Early Ordovician radiation of cephalopods on tropical paleocontinents is illustrated by the diverse fauna (21 genera, 30 species) of the Fort Cassin Formation (Floian and lower Blackhillsian Stage) in northeast Laurentia. Cephalopods occur through the thin (ca. 30–65 m) depositional sequence of the Fort Cassin but are most common and diverse in mollusk-rich, trilobite-poor parts of the formation that characterize the thrombolite-bearing intervals in the shoaling part of the highstand systems tract. This lithofacies-biofacies linkage persists from the Tribes Hill and Rochdale Formations (lower and lower upper Tremadocian, and upper Skullrockian and Stairsian Stages, respectively), and suggests that the Early Ordovician radiations of cephalopods took place in shallow-marine, thrombolite reef facies of tropical carbonate platforms. These habitats differed strongly from the near-shore, peritidal habitats of the older Cambrian evolutionary radiation. Genus-level diversity and absolute abundance changed little through the Skullrockian-Blackhillsian, but morphologic diversity and body size increased dramatically by the late Early Ordovician. The morphological diversification suggests cephalopods diversified into a wider variety of macropredators and more complex late Early Ordovician ecosystems. Anrangeroceras whitehallense n. gen. and n. sp. is proposed. The following are emended: the Protocycloceratidae, Centrotarphyceras and C. seelyi, Protocycloceras and P. lamarcki, and Rudolfoceras cornuoryx. The following are indeterminate and abandoned: Baltoceras? pusillum Ruedemann, 1906; Comeroceras annuliferum Flower, 1941; Cyptendoceras whitfieldi Ulrich et al., 1944; Endoceras? champlainense Ruedemann, 1906; Wolungoceras valcourense Flower, 1964. Beekmanoceras Ulrich and Foerste, 1936 is a gastropod.

Seventeen flexible crinoids, including three new species, are reported from the Fort Payne Formation with new material from Cumberland, Clinton, and Russell Counties in south-central Kentucky and from Clay County, Tennessee. This study extends the geographic range of all taxa studied, as only seven species were previously known from the Fort Payne Formation. Fort Payne flexible crinoids include Taxocrinus colletti, Onychocrinus ramulosus, O. grandis n. sp., Nipterocrinus monroensis, Mespilocrinus romingeri, M. kentuckyensis n. sp., Gaulocrinus veryi, G. robustus, G. trauscholdi, G. bordeni, G. symmetros n. sp., Metichthyocrinus tiaraeformis, M. clarkensis, Forbesiocrinus pyriformis, F. saffordi, F. wortheni, and Wachsmuthicrinus spinosulus. Mespilocrinus columnals are also described, and the diagnosis of N. monroensis is emended. The Fort Payne Formation occurrence of O. exsculptus could not be verified. Forbesiocrinus multibrachiatus and Parichthyocrinus crawfordsvillensis are considered to be junior synonyms of Forbesiocrinus wortheni. Fort Payne flexible crinoids in the Lake Cumberland area occur at nine localities in four facies types. No more than three species occur at any Fort Payne locality.

The first mastotermitid termite from Africa is described and figured from wing fragments recovered from the early Miocene (22–21 Ma) deposits of the Mush Valley, Amhara Region, central Ethiopia. Mastotermes aethiopicus new species is the second fossil termite recorded from Africa and expands the known paleo-distribution of the genus from tropical North America and Europe into northeastern Africa during the Miocene. Mastotermes aethiopicus is distinguished from the living M. darwiniensis Froggatt and other Neogene species of the genus, and comments are provided regarding the occurrence of this genus in the tropical fauna of Miocene Ethiopia.

Brochuchus is a small crocodylid originally based on specimens from the early Miocene of Rusinga Island, Lake Victoria, Kenya. Here, we report occurrences of Brochuchus from several early and middle Miocene sites. Some are from the Lake Victoria region, and others are in the Lake Turkana Basin. Specimens from the middle Miocene Maboko locality form the basis of a new species, Brochuchus parvidens, which has comparatively smaller maxillary alveoli. Because of the smaller alveoli, the teeth appear to be more widely spaced in the new species. We also provide a revised diagnosis for Brochuchus and its type species, B. pigotti. A phylogenetic analysis supports a close relationship between Brochuchus and tube-snouted Euthecodon, but although relationships among crocodylids appear poorly resolved in the set of optimal trees, this is because Brochuchus and Euthecodon, along with early Miocene “Crocodylus” gariepensis from the early Miocene of Namibia, jointly adopt two distinct positions—either closely related to the living sharp-nosed crocodile (Mecistops) or to a group including the living dwarf crocodiles (Osteolaemus). Character support for a close relationship with Mecistops is problematic, and we suspect a closer relationship to Osteolaemus will be recovered with improved sampling, but the results here are ambiguous. In either case, Brochuchus is more closely related to living groups not currently found in East Africa. This material helps constrain the timing of crocodylian faunal turnover in the East African Rift Valley System, with endemic lineages largely being replaced by Crocodylus in the middle or late Miocene possibly in response to regional xerification and the replacement of continuous rainforest cover with open grasslands and savannas.

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The Mysidiellidae are morphologically isolated among Triassic bivalves but share important characters with Late Paleozoic Ambonychioidea. Apart from a great similarity in the general shape of the shell, the most primitive mysidiellid genus Promysidiella resembles ambonychioids in the presence of a duplivincular-opisthodetic ligament system. Within the Mysidiellidae, this ligament type evolved into the transitional ligament system that characterizes Late Triassic Mysidiella. The phyletic polarity indicates that this evolution probably took place by paedomorphosis. New examinations of the shell microstructure of Mysidiella demonstrate the presence of simple prismatic and possibly foliated structures in the calcitic outer shell layer, which further supports an ambonychioid affinity. Therefore, the Mysidiellidae are removed from the Mytiloidea and assigned to the Ambonychioidea. The poorly known genus Protopis, which was originally included in the Mysidiellidae, probably had a parivincular ligament system and was hence a member of the Heteroconchia. Joannina, which was previously considered a junior synonym of Protopis, is re-established. The hinge margin of Joannina carries a well developed nymph but lacks teeth. These characters as well as its modioliform shape, anterior shell lobe, and pronounced diagonal carina link Joannina with the Late Triassic genus Healeya (Modiomorphoidea). Both taxa are herein placed in the new family Healeyidae, which differs from the morphologically similar Kalenteridae in the absence of elaborated hinge teeth. Protopis, as well as the recently described genera Leidapoconcha, Waijiaoella, and Qingyaniola, are tentatively assigned to the Healeyidae.

A new species of boreopterid pterosaur from the new fossil locality, Heichengzi, Beipiao, western Liaoning, China allows a reassessment of the Boreopteridae. In this new analysis, three species, Boreopterus cuiae, Boreopterus giganticus n. sp., and Zhenyuanopterus longirostris, are included within the Boreopteridae united by the autopomorphic occurrence of two main tooth morphologies, an equal length of the tibia and femur, and weak feet. Other taxa previously placed within the Boreopteridae are not in a monophyletic group with the former three species. Boreopterus has fewer teeth and a shorter tooth row than that in Zhenyuanopterus. This new Boreopterus species has a large size, a piriform orbit, an extensively fenestrated lacrimal, and a posteriorly directed lacrimal process, that differs from Boreopterus cuiae.

A large collection of Silurian halysitids, mainly from the Limestone Point, La Vieille, and Petit Rocher Formations of northern New Brunswick, includes nine species distributed among Catenipora Lamarck, Halysites Fischer von Waldheim, and Cystihalysites Tchernyshev. One species, Cystihalysites belledunensis, is new, and, of the others, half are previously unknown in the Chaleur Bay region and half have been described before from this area.

All species are defined using both qualitative and quantitative data. Statistical analysis of serial sections of a corallum of Cystihalysites belledunensis suggests that any random section of a halysitid will yield quantitative data representative of that colony.

Preliminary analysis of the relationships between species distributions and stratigraphy and sedimentary associations suggests strong facies-control on the distribution of the four most abundant species. Both Catenipora simplex (Lambe) and Catenipora micropora (Whitfield) occur mostly in outer shelf facies. Cystihalysites belledunensis n. sp. and Cystihalysites encrustans (Buehler) never occur together, the former being found in predominantly high-energy inner shelf facies and the latter in the outer shelf facies.

Rare specimens of eldonioids recovered from the lower Cambrian (Series 2, Stage 4) Emu Bay Shale (EBS) Konservat-Lagerstätte represent the first record of the group for the Cambrian of East Gondwana. The disc-shaped body of the EBS taxon bears fine concentric corrugations on the dorsal surface and, ventrally, a series of internal lobes that have primary and secondary bifurcations, as well as a coiled sac. It appears to be most similar to Rotadiscus and Pararotadiscus of the Cambrian Chengjiang and Kaili biotas of South China, respectively. While the structure of the internal lobes would indicate that this occurrence in the EBS represents a new taxon within the Rotadiscidae, lack of detail regarding the precise number of internal lobes and the condition of the circumoral tentacles warrants a more conservative approach in leaving the genus and species under open nomenclature. The EBS specimens also host trace fossils, including the remains of a burrow, which are generally lacking in the body-fossil-bearing layers of the Konservat-Lagerstätte interval. These traces appear to have been made by small organisms and are similar to traces associated with the discs of Pararotadiscus guizhouensis (Zhao and Zhu, 1994) from the Kaili Biota. The available taphonomic, paleoenvironmental, and ichnological evidence indicates that the EBS eldonioids are most likely vagrants that were transported or settled into the ‘preservational trap’ and subsequently exposed on the substrate for a brief period before burial, thereby allowing organisms to exploit their carcasses for nutrients or other purposes.