The Cambrian fauna of Massachusetts, characterized by Paradoxides (Hydrocephalus) harlani, is poorly preserved. Better-preserved specimens, occurring within the stratigraphic range of this trilobite in southeastern Newfoundland and Morocco, provide a better understanding of such taxa to widen the scope of correlation. The paradoxidid-bearing Braintree Formation has revealed three trilobite species to add to those recently recorded. They represent Ellipsocephaloidea not previously recognized in this Massachusetts sequence, namely Protoleninae by Hamatolenus (H.) aff. H. (H.) marocanus and H. (Myopsolenus) aff. H. (M.) magnus and Ellipsocephalidae by Holocephalina aff. H. levis, thus strengthening faunal relationships with midshelf Cambrian sequences in Morocco and Spain. Reinterpretations of Agnostida, based on Newfoundland material associated with P. (Hydrocephalus) harlani, indicate that Condylopyge eli and Kiskinella cf. K. cristata signify a stratigraphic position for part of the Massachusetts sequence a little above the first appearance of Ovatoryctocara granulata. Appearance of this latter species is under review as the basal boundary of a global Cambrian stage, and is below the sequence break within the Chamberlain's Brook Formation in Newfoundland marked by the Easter Cove Blister Bed. The problem of differentiating species with numerous variable growth stages is highlighted in the ontogenies and stratigraphic ranges of P. (H.) harlani and P. (Plutonides) haywardi and emphasizes the importance of cephalic morphology in paradoxidid classification. Details of the holotypes of Agraulos quadrangularis and Braintreella rogersi and Czech topotypes of Agraulos ceticephalus supplement generic and specific characters poorly understood, especially those involving proportional differences between tectonically/taphonomically flattened examples and undistorted high-relief specimens.

A new genus and species of eurypterid (Eurypterida: Chelicerata) is described as Orcanopterus manitoulinensis from the Upper Ordovician Kagawong Submember (Upper Member) of the Georgian Bay Formation, Manitoulin Island, Ontario, Canada. The material comprises several partial specimens in addition to disarticulated carapaces, appendages, metastomas, opisthosomal segments, and telsons. Associated fossils include rare bryozoans, a conularid, ostracodes, and conodonts. A restricted marine lagoon, or very shallow subtidal to intertidal environment is inferred. This assemblage, perhaps representing an accumulation of molted exuviae, was apparently preserved as the result of rapid burial by carbonate muds and silts during a storm event. O. manitoulinensis shares a number of traits with both the Hughmilleriidae and the Carcinosomatidae. Diagnostic features include curved preabdominal segments, a petaloid A metastoma with deep anterior emargination, spiniferous appendages of Carcinosoma type, paddle with enlarged, symmetrical podomere 9, and a xiphous telson. It is only the fourth (the first Canadian) well-documented Ordovician eurypterid genus, and provides the oldest reliable record of the Hughmillerioidea to date.

The oldest echinoderms and first cornute stylophorans ever reported from Korea are described, based on more than 40 specimens collected from the Late Cambrian of the Taebaeksan Basin. New material doubles the number of stylophorans described from Asia and the number of specimens of Late Cambrian stylophorans recorded throughout the world. Three different cornutes are identified: Sokkaejaecystis serrata n. gen. and sp. and two genus and species indeterminate forms A and B. Sokkaejaecystis serrata and indeterminate form B are assigned to the Chauvelicystinae, while the systematic position of indeterminate form A within cornutes is difficult to assess. This new material suggests paleobiogeographic connections between echinoderm faunas from Korea, western North America (Wyoming), and western Europe (Montagne Noire, Shropshire). A cladistic analysis of selected cothurnocystids shows that Sokkaejaecystis n. gen. is closely related to Prochauvelicystis and the sister group of a clade uniting Ampelocarpus with Lyricocarpus. The analysis also confirms the placement of Milonicystis within the Chauvelicystinae and questions the monophyly of the genus Chauvelicystis.

Two new flat-backed archipolypodan millipede taxa, Orsadesmus rubecollus n. gen. and sp. and Zanclodesmus willetti n. gen. and sp., are described from the Upper Devonian of Clinton County, Pennsylvania, and Miguasha, Québec, respectively. These new taxa are placed in the new family Zanclodesmidae within the order Archidesmida. Archidesmida have previously only been described from the United Kingdom, and their presence in North America confirms a geographic continuum in the millipede fauna across the Old Red Sandstone Continent during the Devonian.

A single specimen of a likely sphaeromatoid isopod is described from the Upper Bathonian of northern France at Ranville, Normandy. The remarkable three-dimensional preservation consists of only the head and first pereionite, but clearly constitutes a new genus and species, Reboursia ranvillensis.

The holotype of the ceratopsid dinosaur Torosaurus (=Arrhinoceratops?) utahensis (Gilmore, 1946) consists of a right squamosal, jugal, quadrate, quadratojugal, epijugal, lacrimal, and postorbital horncore/orbital region. Some elements previously described by Gilmore (1946), notably the epoccipitals and parietals, were not originally included, so they cannot be considered part of the holotype. Associated elements (lower jaws and others), which may pertain to the holotype, are described for the first time; they, too, are not formally considered part of the type material, but they provide additional information regarding the osteology of this rare chasmosaurine.

Torosaurus utahensis differs from T. latus (type species) in having a squamosal that is shorter and squared-off at its distal end and an unusually expanded horncore base that lies above and anterior to the orbit. In contrast, T. latus has unusually long, attenuated triangular squamosals and a more restricted horncore base. The otic notch is more open in T. utahensis than T. latus. The genus Torosaurus is distinguished from other chasmosaurine genera by a combination of characters including a broad, thin, sheetlike parietal with relatively small, nearly circular fenestrae and broad median parietal bar; convex posterior margin of parietal; and relatively straight postorbital horncores that are oval (elliptical) in cross section.

Bona fide records of T. latus from Montana, South Dakota, and Wyoming are from strata of Lancian (late Maastrichtian) age. Previous reports of Torosaurus from the Naashoibito Member of the Ojo Alamo Formation (Lehman, 1981, 1985, 1996) in the San Juan Basin and the McRae Formation (Lucas et al., 1998), New Mexico, as well as the single Torosaurus record from Saskatchewan (Tokaryk, 1986), are based on specimens that can at best be identified as Chasmosaurinae genus indeterminate, because they lack derived features of the taxon. Putative Torosaurus specimens from the Big Bend region of Texas (Lawson, 1976; Lehman, 1996) are also considered as indeterminate chasmosaurines. All records of Torosaurus are Maastrichtian in age, but records of T. utahensis appear to be older than those of T. latus.

A new genus and three new species of echinoids occur in several horizons of an echinoderm Lagerstätten in the Winchell Formation of north-central Texas. This occurrence is dominated by several thousand specimens of Archaeocidaris brownwoodensis new species, a medium-sized archaeocidarid with long, triangular, ornate spines. Another rare archaeocidarid, Archaeocidaris apheles n. sp., is a small, smooth-spined species. The second most abundant echinoid is Elliptechinus kiwiaster n. gen. and sp., an unusual elliptical lepidocentrid, which extends the range of lepidocentrids into the Pennsylvanian (Late Carboniferous). A fourth echinoid, an unidentified echinocystitid, is known from one disarticulated specimen and appears to be mostly composed of ambulacral plates of varying shape and size.

Thirty-four crinoid species, including four new species, are reported from the Nada Member of the Borden Formation in eastern Kentucky. The dominant crinoid group is monobathrids (18 species), but diplobathrids, disparids, cladids, and flexibles are also present. The four new species are the camerates Blairocrinus protuberatus, Uperocrinus acuminatus, and Aorocrinus nodulus, and the cladid Atelestocrinus kentuckyensis. The majority of the species in this fauna were previously known from what has traditionally been considered the “upper part” of the Burlington Limestone in the Mississippi River Valley and what is now recognized as the Burlington Pelmatozoan Assemblage III. The current study confirms the conclusion of Lane and DuBar (1983) that the Nada is middle Osagean in age, being deposited earlier than the well-documented Borden delta crinoid assemblages of north-central Kentucky and Indiana. The middle Osagean age of the fauna indicates a previously unrecognized unconformity between the Nada and the overlying Meramecian-age Renfro Member of the Slade Formation. In addition, this is the first well-documented middle Osagean fauna from a siliciclastic facies in North America. The dominance by camerate crinoids is enigmatic, but may be related to either a low rate of sedimentation or greater larval dispersal abilities.

Representatives of several genera of late Paleozoic Caenogastropoda have been studied based on exceptionally well-preserved material from the latest Permian of south China, the Pennsylvanian of the United States, and the Early Carboniferous of Australia. This material has well-preserved protoconchs which are relatively rare in Paleozoic gastropods. The morphology of the protoconch and especially that of planktotrophic larval shells gives crucial taxonomic and phylogenetic information. It helps to recognize convergence, which is common in Gastropoda. The larval shell morphology of the following taxa is discussed and illustrated: Platyzona (Goniasmatidae), Erwinispira n. gen. (Erwinispirinae n. subfam.), Propupaspira (Propupaspiridae), Soleniscus (Soleniscidae), Meekospiridae, and Chlorozyga (Imoglobidae). The new species Meekospira? solenisiciforma is described. The main diagnostic feature of the order Procaenogastropoda, a fluent protoconch/teleoconch transition, probably represents a preservational artifact. An abrupt transition indicating metamorphosis can be shown for several genera which have been assigned to the Procaenogastropoda. Therefore, the monophyly of the Procaenogastropoda is questioned, and the taxon is refuted. While the caenogastropods of latest Permian gastropod faunas are dominated by typical late Paleozoic genera and families, the Early Triassic is characterized by an almost complete faunal turnover of caenogastropod genera.

A new species of clawed lobster, Hoploparia albertaensis, is reported from the late Coniacian, shallow-marine Bad Heart Formation of northwestern Alberta, Canada. Hoploparia is a well-known, clawed lobster genus with a record extending from Early Cretaceous (Valanginian) to Miocene. Fifty-one species of Hoploparia are known worldwide; 13 from the North American Western Interior Seaway. None of the 12 other Interior Seaway species, of any age, closely resembles the new species. The new species strongly resembles Hoploparia gabbi Pilsbry, 1901 from the upper Santonian–lower Campanian of the U.S. Mid-Atlantic Coastal Plain.

The lichenocrinid holdfast of Cincinnaticrinus varibrachialus Warn and Strimple, 1977 was attached to a variety of hard objects, i.e., crinoid stems, twig-shaped and flat bryozoans, brachiopods, bivalves, cephalopod shells, trilobites, and phosphate nodules, throughout life. This represents an adaptation to a soft substrate and most individuals are found in carbonate or carbonate-clay muds that were deposited in moderately deep and quiet water. Evidence from living and fossil crinoids suggests that the cincinnaticrinid column either required little nourishment from the crown or it may even have been metabolically self sustaining. The food-gathering system mainly needs to supply the energy needs of the crown with little or no contribution to the stem. Very likely, this applies to many crinoids. Consequently, it is appropriate to analyze the food gathering system with respect to the crown volume as a size parameter.

The aboral cup grows slowly compared to the arms. Brachs and ramulars show little shape change. Length of the column is augmented by formation of new columnals and size increase of old ones at all growth stages. Virtually all new columnals form by intercalation between older plates rather than being initiated immediately below the aboral cup. Most size-related variables in the arms are characterized by positive allometry relative to crown volume. New arm branches develop continuously. Likewise, new brachs and ramulars appear at the distal tips of all arms. This plate supply rate along with deposition of calcite on old arm plates produces an exponentially increasing growth rate for total length of the arms. Food-gathering capacity equals the number of food-catching tubefeet times the average food groove width. Due to the positive allometry of the size of the arms, the ratio of food-gathering capacity:crown volume is constant regardless of size so the capacity of the food-gathering system keeps pace with the tissue that must be fed. However, the average food groove width only changes slightly so that youngsters and adults ate food particles of about the same size.

Variation in number of brachs in the arms of C. varibrachialus is comparable to that of many Ordovician cladids. Specimens of C. varibrachialus from the Kope Formation of the Cincinnati, Ohio, area possess more numerous primibrachs than animals from the Walcott-Rust Quarry, although the two populations overlap greatly. Intercalated brachs are known in the midcontinent crinoids but not in the New York specimens. The basic arm structure, cup and crown shapes, ornamentation, and the morphology of the columnals and the holdfast of all crinoids are identical and the midcontinent and New York suites of crinoids are considered conspecific.

Remains of Halisaurus sternbergi (Wiman, 1920) from the latest Early Campanian (sensu germanico) of the Kristianstad Basin, southern Sweden, represent the first record of this species outside of the USA. The material comprises numerous marginal tooth-crowns, a premaxilla, an incomplete pterygoid, and vertebrae. The Kristianstad Basin population of H. sternbergi was probably derived from individuals that migrated from the Mississippi Embayment in North America sometime during the Early Campanian. Even though H. sternbergi thrived in great numbers in the coastal waters of the southern part of the Baltic Shield during the latest Early Campanian, the population appears to have been short-lived. Available data indicate that H. sternbergi, along with several other species of mosasaurs, vanished from the region following an intercontinental mosasaur extinction event, or a series of events, near the Early/Late Campanian boundary.

A new species of polycotylid, Dolichorhynchops herschelensis, is described based on a well-preserved skeleton from the Upper Cretaceous (Campanian–Maastrichtian) Bearpaw Formation of Herschel, Saskatchewan. Its small size as an adult, the sharp rise in front of the parietal crest, and the straight ilium with narrow dorsal end are diagnostic features of this taxon. This is the first polycotylid plesiosaur described from the Bearpaw Formation, deposited during the critical period when polycotylids were disappearing from the Western Interior of North America.

A small early Late Viséan (Mississippian) ammonoid assemblage with Entogonites saharensis new species and Goniatites lazarus new species is described from the eastern Anti–Atlas of Morocco, being the first African record of Entogonites. The family Goniatitidae is a typical Lazarus taxon, which, after a gap representing approximately 10 million years, reappears in the fossil record. The genera Entogonites and Goniatites have a wide paleogeographic distribution (northwest Laurentia, northern and southern Variscides, north Gondwana). This indicates ammonoid cosmopolitism at the genus level at the end of the middle Viséan, before late Viséan ammonoid provinces formed. Entogonites with tetrangularly coiled juvenile whorls and with a low aperture probably had a planktonic life- style.

Burrows of the lysorophid amphibian Brachydectes elongatus occur in deposits interpreted as ephemeral ponds within the Lower Permian Speiser Shale of eastern Kansas. The burrows of B. elongatus have been previously recorded in the Lower Permian strata of Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas, but have not been described in detail and an ichnotaxonomic designation has not been provided. Torridorefugium eskridgensis new ichnogenus and ichnospecies show two types of burrow architecture distinguished by width-to-length ratios. Type I burrows are elongate, elliptical tubes 4–32 cm long and 2–7 cm wide. Type II burrows are short, elliptical tubes 1.5–3.5 cm long and 2.5–5 cm wide. Both Type I and II burrows may contain coiled skeletons of B. elongatus. Torridorefugium eskridgensis occur in clusters of up to 45 burrows with maximum concentrations of 20/m2.

The type specimens of Torridorefugium eskridgensis occur in a 40–cm-thick lens of calcareous mudstone that fills a 100–m-long paleodepression within a well-developed paleosol. The burrow clusters are capped by surfaces with evidence of subaerial exposure, and overlain by nonburrowed, massive mudstone containing the fossils of the charophyte Stomachara, the ostracodes Carbonita and Paraparchites, fish, amphibians, and reptiles. This succession suggests that lysorophids burrowed in response to episodic, perhaps seasonal, droughts on the Permian midcontinental coastal plain. Permian lysorophid burrowing behavior is analogous to that of the extant aestivating amphibians Amphiuma sp. and Siren intermedia that inhabit ephemeral rivers and ponds of the southeastern United States.

Neoplagiaulacid multituberculates are among the most numerous and best represented members of early Cenozoic North American mammal faunas, achieving their greatest diversity during the Paleocene. Despite their relatively dense record in the Torrejonian (middle Paleocene) and Tiffanian (late Paleocene), the study of early Cenozoic neoplagiaulacids has been limited more often than not to isolated teeth or, more rarely, incomplete skull, gnathic, or postcranial remains. The current study reports on new neoplagiaulacid multituberculates from the Paleocene Paskapoo Formation of central Alberta, Canada, at localities along the Blindman River near the City of Red Deer. The exceptionally well-preserved specimens consist of incomplete articulated and associated skull and gnathic remains, and collectively document four new species: Ectypodus elaphus, Neoplagiaulax serrator, Neoplagiaulax paskapooensis, and Neoplagiaulax cimolodontoides. Neoplagiaulax paskapooensis is the most dentally complete neoplagiaulacid so far discovered, with a single specimen documenting for the first time left and right I2 and I3 in situ with the cheek teeth, along with the associated lower dentition. Specimens of Neoplagiaulax cimolodontoides record important details of the rostrum and palate, and provide the first direct evidence of incisor replacement in Neoplagiaulax. The new neoplagiaulacids, together with other multituberculates from the Blindman River localities, document unusually high multituberculate diversity in the latter half of the Tiffanian in western Canada. Despite superficial similarity to some European species of Neoplagiaulax, the new taxa from the Paskapoo Formation apparently show no closer relationship to these than do other North American congeners, suggesting parallel evolution in endemic North America and western European clades.

Fungal hyphae, unicellular algae, and filiform prokaryotic inclusions are the most abundant microfossils of the Cretaceous amber of Schliersee (Bavaria, southern Germany). These prokaryotes are described as Leptotrichites resinatus new genus and species, and interpreted as sheathed bacteria with similarities to the extant genus Leptothrix Kützing, 1843. However, the micromorphological and microanalytical features of this new species do not correspond entirely with those of the modern sheathed bacteria. Previous interpretations of these inclusions as filiform cyanobacteria, algae, and fungi have to be revised. Together with their numerous syninclusions, mainly fossil ciliates, testaceans, and microalgae, these prokaryotes belonged to a Cenomanian limnetic microcenosis of water bodies, such as ponds close to the resin-producing trees. Actualistic paleontological experiments reveal how these soft-bodied microorganisms could have been embedded in resins.

Disrupted conodont bedding plane assemblages are described from two laterally equivalent mudstone core samples of the Lower Mississippian upper shale member of the Bakken Formation in the subsurface of southeastern Alberta and southwestern Saskatchewan. The core bedding plane conodont assemblage representing the bispathodid biofacies from southeastern Alberta (Locality 1) shows little evidence of winnowing. Thus, this assemblage, along with collections of discrete conodont elements, is a potential source of data for reconstructing paleoecology and taphonomy as well as for testing apparatus reconstructions. The assemblage representing the siphonodellid biofacies from the southwestern Saskatchewan core (Locality 2) shows evidence of a greater degree of breakage and winnowing of elements, making it less suitable as a source of data. Postmortem compaction of mudstones and processing methods also affect the preservation of the conodont elements, due to breakage along lines of fracture in the elements. An apparatus reconstruction is proposed for Prioniodina aff. P. curvidens.

In North America, the ammonoid Uraloceras Ruzhentsev occurs in Cisuralian (Lower Permian) strata of the northern Yukon Territory, eastern Alaska, Ellesmere Island, southern British Columbia, and Nevada. From Sakmarian to Kungurian, species of Uraloceras occupied a narrow belt in the Northern Hemisphere (Boreal paleogeographical realm) that extended from the northern and northwestern margin of the Pangaean supercontinent southward to regions of present-day Siberia, the Ural Mountains, as well as Nei Monggol and Tibet. In the Yukon Territory, Nevada, Nei Monggol, and possibly Tibet, the association of Uraloceras with typically equatorial perrinitid ammonoids may represent a transition from “Boreal” occurrences in high latitudes to “Tethyan” of lower latitudes. Uraloceras nevadense n. sp. is described herein from Nevada and eastern Alaska.

Berriochloa gabeli n. sp. and Berriochloa huletti n. sp. are described from fossil anthoecia (husks) recovered in late Miocene (Ash Hollow Formation) sediments in central Nebraska and central and western Kansas. Comparisons with other known fossil and living grasses suggest relationships with members of the grass tribe Stipeae and previously described B. intermedia Elias, 1942 from Ash Hollow deposits in north-central Kansas. Berriochloa gabeli and B. huletti were recovered in direct association with, or in the close vicinity, of rich biotas that provide evidence of widespread, probably treeless, grasslands with adjacent moist riparian habitats along streams or around temporary pools of water during deposition. Fossil vertebrates associated with the grasses at some sites suggest that the age of B. gabeli and B. huletti is early to middle Hemphillian.