GEOS1211 Lecture Notes - Lecture 14: Archaeopteryx, Tyrannosaurus, Megafauna
14 Jun 2018
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Lecture 14 learning outcomes
• Outline the major changes to life through time and how these are studied using the fossil
record
Proterozoic eon (2500-630Ma)->
- Ediacaran-> weird fossils (Dickinsonia)
Paleozoic era (630-251 Ma)->
- Cambrian-> Burgess shale (Hallucigenia)
- Ordovician-> trilobites galore
- Silurian-> eurypterids (Pterygotus)
- Devonian-> age of fish (placoderms)
- Carboniferous-> dragonflies (Meganeura)
- Lower Permian-> plants (Glossopteris)
- Permian-Triassic-> mass extinction
o Volcanism: Acid rain/ dust clouds
o Anoxia: Low O2 oceans
o Pangea: Loss of coastline
Mesozoic (251-65Ma)->
- Triassic-> synapsids (Placerias)
- Jurassic-> birds (Archaeopteryx lithographica)
- Cretaceous-> therapods (Tyrannosaurus rex)
- Late Cretaceous-> mass extinction
Cenozoic (65- Now)->
- Paleogene-> oil
- Neogene-> plate collisions modern distributions
- Quaternary-> ice age & mega fauna
• Describe the process of fossilisation
Have at least some hard parts
Die near a lagoon (favourable depositional environment)
Sedimentation needs to be constant
Make sure the lagoon is anoxic
Keep away from mountains and coarse sediment
Wait until a palaeontologist digs you up
• Describe different branches of palaeontology
Palaeontology- a science dealing with the life of past geological periods as known from fossil remains
- Paleobiology-> a branch of paleontology concerned with the biology of fossil organisms
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