BarapasaurusBarapasaurus (bəˌrɑːpəˈsɔːrəs ) is a genus of basal sauropod dinosaur from Jurassic rocks of India. The only species is B. tagorei. Barapasaurus comes from the lower part of the Kota Formation, which is of Early to Middle Jurassic age. It is therefore one of the earliest known sauropods. Barapasaurus is known from approximately 300 bones from at least six individuals, so that the skeleton is almost completely known except for the anterior cervical vertebrae and the skull.
SolnhofenSolnhofen is a municipality in the district of Weißenburg-Gunzenhausen in the region of Middle Franconia in the Land of Bavaria in Germany. It is in the Altmühl valley. The local area is famous in geology and palaeontology for Solnhofen limestone. This is a very fine-grained limestone from the Jurassic period Lagerstätte that preserves detailed fossil specimens. Alois Senefelder used specially prepared blocks of the fine Solnhofen limestone for the process of lithography which he invented in 1798.
PodocarpaceaePodocarpaceae is a large family of mainly Southern Hemisphere conifers, known in English as podocarps, comprising about 156 species of evergreen trees and shrubs. It contains 19 genera if Phyllocladus is included and Manoao and Sundacarpus are recognized. The family is a classic member of the Antarctic flora, with its main centres of diversity in Australasia, particularly New Caledonia, Tasmania, and New Zealand, and to a slightly lesser extent Malesia and South America (primarily in the Andes Mountains).
Aragonite seaAn aragonite sea contains aragonite and high-magnesium calcite as the primary inorganic calcium carbonate precipitates. The chemical conditions of the seawater must be notably high in magnesium content relative to calcium (high Mg/Ca ratio) for an aragonite sea to form. This is in contrast to a calcite sea in which seawater low in magnesium content relative to calcium (low Mg/Ca ratio) favors the formation of low-magnesium calcite as the primary inorganic marine calcium carbonate precipitate.
MuschelkalkThe Muschelkalk (German for "shell-bearing limestone"; calcaire coquillier) is a sequence of sedimentary rock strata (a lithostratigraphic unit) in the geology of central and western Europe. It has a Middle Triassic (240 to 230 million years) age and forms the middle part of the three-part Germanic Trias (that gives the Triassic its name) lying above the older Buntsandstein and below the younger Keuper. The Muschelkalk ("mussel-chalk") consists of a sequence of limestone and dolomite beds.
BelemnitidaBelemnitida (or belemnites) is an extinct order of squid-like cephalopods that existed from the Late Triassic to Late Cretaceous. Unlike squid, belemnites had an internal skeleton that made up the cone. The parts are, from the arms-most to the tip: the tongue-shaped pro-ostracum, the conical phragmocone, and the pointy guard. The calcitic guard is the most common belemnite remain. Belemnites, in life, are thought to have had 10 hooked arms and a pair of fins on the guard.
GravisauriaGravisauria is a clade of sauropod dinosaurs consisting of some genera, Vulcanodontidae and Eusauropoda. The clade Gravisauria was appointed by the French paleontologist Ronan Allain and Moroccan paleontologist Najat Aquesbi in 2008 when a cladistic analysis of the dinosaur found by Allain, Tazoudasaurus, as the outcome was that the family Vulcanodontidae. The group includes Tazoudasaurus and Vulcanodon, and the sister taxon Eusauropoda, but also certain species such as Antetonitrus, Gongxianosaurus and Isanosaurus that do not belong in Vulcanodontidae but to an even more basic position occupied in Sauropoda.
WeevilWeevils are beetles belonging to the superfamily Curculionoidea, known for their elongated snouts. They are usually small–less than in length–and herbivorous. Approximately 97,000 species of weevils are known. They belong to several families, with most of them in the family Curculionidae (the true weevils). It also includes bark beetles, which while morphologically dissimilar to other weevils in lacking the distinctive snout, is a subfamily of Curculionidae.
Caecilian(sᵻˈsɪliən) are a group of limbless, vermiform (worm-shaped) or serpentine (snake-shaped) amphibians. They mostly live hidden in soil or in streambeds, and this cryptic lifestyle renders caecilians among the least familiar amphibians. Modern caecilians live in the tropics of South and Central America, Africa, and southern Asia. Caecilians feed on small subterranean creatures such as earthworms. The body is cylindrical and often darkly coloured, and the skull is bullet-shaped and strongly built.
ChemostratigraphyChemostratigraphy, or chemical stratigraphy, is the study of the chemical variations within sedimentary sequences to determine stratigraphic relationships. The field is relatively young, having only come into common usage in the early 1980s, but the basic idea of chemostratigraphy is nearly as old as stratigraphy itself: distinct chemical signatures can be as useful as distinct fossil assemblages or distinct lithographies in establishing stratigraphic relationships between different rock layers.