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A new terrestrial millipede fauna of earliest Carboniferous (Tournaisian) age from southeastern Scotland helps fill ‘Romer's Gap'

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 July 2018

Andrew J. Ross ,
Gregory D. Edgecombe ,
Neil D. L. Clark ,
Carys E. Bennett ,
Vicen Carrió ,
Rubén Contreras-Izquierdo  and
Bill Crighton
Andrew J. Ross*
Affiliation:
Department of Natural Sciences, National Museums Scotland, Chambers Street, Edinburgh EH1 1JF, UK. a.ross@nms.ac.uk
Gregory D. Edgecombe
Affiliation:
Department of Earth Sciences, The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD, UK. Email: g.edgecombe@nhm.ac.uk
Neil D. L. Clark
Affiliation:
The Hunterian, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8QQ, UK. Email: neil.clark@glasgow.ac.uk
Carys E. Bennett
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, University of Leicester, Leicester LE1 7RH, UK. Email: ceb28@leicester.ac.uk
Vicen Carrió
Affiliation:
Department of Natural Sciences, National Museums Scotland, Chambers Street, Edinburgh EH1 1JF, UK. a.ross@nms.ac.uk
Rubén Contreras-Izquierdo
Affiliation:
Department of Natural Sciences, National Museums Scotland, Chambers Street, Edinburgh EH1 1JF, UK. a.ross@nms.ac.uk
Bill Crighton
Affiliation:
Department of Natural Sciences, National Museums Scotland, Chambers Street, Edinburgh EH1 1JF, UK. a.ross@nms.ac.uk
*
*Corresponding authors
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Abstract

A diverse millipede (diplopod) fauna has been recovered from the earliest Carboniferous (Tournaisian) Ballagan Formation of the Scottish Borders, discovered by the late Stan Wood. The material is generally fragmentary; however, six different taxa are present based on seven specimens. Only one displays enough characters for formal description and is named Woodesmus sheari Ross, Edgecombe & Clark gen. & sp. nov. The absence of paranota justifies the erection of Woodesmidae fam. nov. within the Archipolypoda. The diverse fauna supports the theory that an apparent lack of terrestrial animal fossils from ‘Romer's Gap' was due to a lack of collecting and suitable deposits, rather than to low oxygen levels as previously suggested.

Keywords

ArchidesmidaArchipolypodaBallagan FormationCourceyanHelminthomorphaJuliformiaMississippianWoodesmus
Type
Articles
Information
Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of The Royal Society of Edinburgh , Volume 108 , Issue 1: A Legacy in Fossils: a Tribute to Stan Wood , March 2017 , pp. 99 - 110
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Society of Edinburgh 2018 

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