C. Supporting Statement For comparison and completeness of this proposal Latimeria chalumnae is also discussed. Coelacanths (Latimeria spp.) are the sole survivors of an ancient Devonian lineage of crossopterygian fish, which played a pivotal role in the evolution of land-living tetrapods. The species with the extremely slow evolutionary rate and an enormous evolutionary age represents the clas...

Coombs Hill, a new fossil locality in the Witpoort Formation (Witteberg Group) of South Africa, preserves record Famennian (Late Devonian) life Gondwana. Fossil plants collected at Hill are preliminarily assigned to several classes. Shelly invertebrates include variety bivalve mollusc forms, some which appear be preserved position. Biodiversity is comparable that well-known Waterloo Farm lagers...

abundance and multilateral extension of prominent genus and species of brachiopoda in the majority of sedimentation series of the late devonian have been observed in all parts of iran. the variability and rapid change in this respect has made it possible to delineate different lines of orthogenetism, biozonation and present biostratigraphical models at the sub-stage level. these characteristics...

Abundance and multilateral extension of prominent genus and species of Brachiopoda in the majority of sedimentation series of the Late Devonian have been observed in all parts of Iran. The variability and rapid change in this respect has made it possible to delineate different lines of orthogenetism, biozonation and present biostratigraphical models at the sub-stage level. These characteristics...

Tetrapods evolved from sarcopterygian fishes in the Devonian and were the first vertebrates to colonize land. The locomotor component of this transition can be divided into four major events: terrestriality, the origins of digited limbs, solid substrate-based locomotion, and alternating gaits that use pelvic appendages as major propulsors. As the sister group to tetrapods, lungfish are a morpho...

The fossils assigned to the tetrapod stem group document the evolution of terrestrial vertebrates from lobe-finned fishes. During the past 15 years the phylogenetic structure of this stem group has remained remarkably stable, even when accommodating major new discoveries such as the elpistostegid Tiktaalik. Here we present a large tetrapodomorph fish from the Late Devonian of China that disrupt...

Due to morphological resemblance, polypterid fishes are used as extant analogues of Late Devonian lobe-finned sarcopterygians to identify the features that allowed the evolution of a terrestrial lifestyle in early tetrapods. Previous studies using polypterids showed how terrestrial locomotion capacity can develop, and how air ventilation for breathing was possible in extinct tetrapodomorphs. In...

A nautiloid conch containing many disarticulated exoskeletons of Omegops cornelius (Phacopidae, Trilobita) was found in the Upper Devonian Hongguleleng Formation of the northwestern margin of the Junggar Basin, NW China. The similar number of cephala, thoraces and pygidia, unbroken thoraces, explicit exuviae, and lack of other macrofossils in the conch, indicate that at least seven individual t...