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Science 5 May 2000:
Vol. 288. no. 5467, pp. 841 - 845
DOI: 10.1126/science.288.5467.841
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Reports

Age of Neoproterozoic Bilatarian Body and Trace Fossils, White Sea, Russia: Implications for Metazoan Evolution

M. W. Martin, 1* D. V. Grazhdankin, 2dagger S. A. Bowring, 1 D. A. D. Evans, 3ddagger M. A. Fedonkin, 2 J. L. Kirschvink 3

A uranium-lead zircon age for a volcanic ash interstratified with fossil-bearing, shallow marine siliciclastic rocks in the Zimnie Gory section of the White Sea region indicates that a diverse assemblage of body and trace fossils occurred before 555.3 ± 0.3 million years ago. This age is a minimum for the oldest well-documented triploblastic bilaterian Kimberella. It also makes co-occurring trace fossils the oldest that are reliably dated. This determination of age implies that there is no simple relation between Ediacaran diversity and the carbon isotopic composition of Neoproterozoic seawater.

1 Department of Earth Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
2 Paleontological Institute, 123 Profsoyuznaya, Moscow, 117868, Russia.
3 Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences, 170-25, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
*   To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: mwm{at}mit.edu

dagger    Present address: Department of Earth Sciences, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, CB2 3EQ, UK.

ddagger    Present address: Tectonics Special Research Centre, University of Western Australia, Nedlands, WA 6907, Australia.

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