Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-j824f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-14T13:25:42.985Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Ordovician matground and mixground ecosystems in shoreface–offshore and barrier-island environments from Central Iran, northern Gondwana

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 April 2022

Aram Bayet-Goll Open the ORCID record for Aram Bayet-Goll [Opens in a new window]
Aram Bayet-Goll*
Affiliation:
Department of Earth Sciences, Institute for Advanced Studies in Basic Sciences (IASBS), Zanjan45137-66731, Iran
*
Author for correspondence: Aram Bayet-Goll, Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The shift of matground ecosystems to bioturbator-free settings was investigated in the Ordovician wave-dominated marine strata of the Shirgesht Formation in Central Iran. Ten ichnofabrics are recognized in shoreface–offshore and barrier-island sedimentary facies, representing a proximal-to-distal depositional trend along the studied profile. In the offshore settings, intensive burrowing on several tiers and bioirrigation, referred to the Thalassinoides (Th), Cruziana–Skolithos–Rosselia (CrSkRo), crowded Trichophycus (CT) and Cruziana–Helminthopsis (CrHe) ichnofabrics, prevented the development of matgrounds. As a result of the Ordovician radiation, progressive ecospace utilization by suspension-, deposit- and detritus-feeders, as represented by the Skolithos (Sk), Rosselia–Skolithos (RoSk), crowded Rosselia (CR) and Conichnus–Skolithos (CoSk) ichnofabrics, is regarded as a key factor for sediment mixing and reworking and thus disruption of the matgrounds in shoreface settings. However, the restriction on microbial growth was reduced in lower-offshore / shelf or tidal-flat and back-barrier settings, where Chondrites–Planolites (ChPl) and Planolites (Pl) ichnofabrics dominate. This restricted microbial growth resulted from physico-chemical stresses on infaunal communities, as shown by the low ichnodiversity, scattered burrowing, absence of complex tiering, and prevalence of simple feeding strategies. This study suggests that following the early Palaeozoic evolutionary radiations, a considerable increase in abundance of detritus-feeders, deposit-feeders, suspension-feeders, predators, vagile bilaterian metazoans and grazers in shallow-water benthic communities caused mat-building microorganisms to migrate into lower-offshore / shelf, tidal-flat and back-barrier settings, where colonization by burrowing organisms was delayed.

Keywords

matgroundmixgroundichnofabricevolutionary radiationmat-building microorganismsOrdovician
Type
Original Article
Information
Geological Magazine , Volume 159 , Issue 6 , June 2022 , pp. 925 - 953
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aghanabati, A (2004) Geology of Iran. Tehran: Geological Survey of Iran, 434 pp. (in Persian).Google Scholar
Bailey, JV, Corsetti, FA, Bottjer, DJ and Marenco, KN (2006) Microbially-mediated environmental influences on metazoan colonization of matground ecosystems: evidence from the Lower Cambrian Harkless Formation. Palaios 21, 215–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Banerjee, S and Jeevankumar, S (2005) Microbially originated wrinkle structures on sandstones and their stratigraphic context: Paleoproterozoic Koldaha Shale, central India. Sedimentary Geology 176, 211–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bayet-Goll, A, Buatois, LA, Mángano, MG and Daraei, M (2021b) The interplay of environmental constraints and bioturbation on matground development along the marine depositional profile during the Ordovician Radiation. Geobiology. doi: 10.1111/gbi.12473.Google ScholarPubMed
Bayet-Goll, A, Buatois, LA, Mángano, MG and Daraei, M (2022) The interplay of environmental constraints and bioturbation on matground development along the marine depositional profile during the Ordovician Radiation. Geobiology 20, 233–270.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bayet-Goll, A and Daraei, M (2020) Palaeoecological, sedimentological and stratigraphical insights into microbially induced sedimentary structures of the lower Cambrian successions of Iran. Sedimentology 67, 3199–235.Google Scholar
Bayet-Goll, A, Daraei, M, Geyer, G, Bahrami, N and Bagheri, F (2021a) Environmental constraints on the distribution of matground and mixground ecosystems across the Cambrian Series 2 – Miaolingian boundary interval in Iran: a case study for the central sector of northern Gondwana. Journal of African Earth Sciences 176, 104120.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bayet-Goll, A, Geyer, G and Daraei, M (2018) Tectonic and eustatic controls on the spatial distribution and stratigraphic architecture of late early Cambrian successions at the northern Gondwana margin: the siliciclastic-carbonate successions of the Lalun Formation in central Iran. Marine and Petroleum Geology 98, 199–228.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bayet-Goll, A, Geyer, G, Wilmsen, M, Mahboubi, A and Moussavi-Harami, R (2014) Facies architecture, depositional environments and stratigraphy of the middle Cambrian Fasham and Deh-Sufiyan formations in the central Alborz, Iran. Facies 60, 815–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bayet-Goll, A, Knaust, D, Daraei, M, Bahrami, N and Bagheri, F (2021d) Rosselia ichnofabrics from the Lower Ordovician of the Alborz Mountains (northern Iran): palaeoecology, palaeobiology and sedimentology. Palaeobiodiversity and Palaeoenvironments. doi: 10.1007/s12549-021-00493-0.Google Scholar
Bayet-Goll, A, Myrow, PM, Aceñolaza, GF, Moussavi-Harami, R and Mahboubi, A (2016) Depositional controls on the ichnology of Palaeozoic wave-dominated marine facies: new evidence from the Shirgesht Formation, central Iran. Acta Geologica Sinica 90, 1801–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bayet-Goll, A, Uchman, A, Daraei, M and Neto de Carvalho, C (2021c) Crowded Trichophycus ichnofabrics in the Early Ordovician successions of central Iran: insight into the Ordovician radiation. Lethaia 54, 314–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berberian, M and King, GCP (1981) Towards a paleogeography and tectonic evolution of Iran. Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 18, 210–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bose, S and Chafetz, HS (2009) Topographic control on distribution of modern microbially induced sedimentary structures (MISS): a case study from Texas coast. Sedimentary Geology 213, 136–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bottjer, DJ, Hagadorn, JW and Dornbos, SQ (2000) The Cambrian substrate revolution. GSA Today 10, 1–7.Google Scholar
Bottjer, DJ and Hagadorn, JW (2007) Mat growth features. In Atlas of Microbial Mat Features Preserved within the Siliciclastic Rock Record (eds Schieber, J, Bose, P, Eriksson, PG, Banerjee, S, Altermann, W and Catuneanu, O), pp. 53–71. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Bromley, RG (1996) Trace Fossils: Biology, Taphonomy and Applications. London: Chapman and Hall.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buatois, LA and Mángano, MG (2011a) Ichnology: Organism–Substrate Interactions in Space and Time. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 358 pp.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buatois, LA and Mángano, MG (2011b) The déjà vu effect: recurrent patterns in exploitation of ecospace, establishment of the mixed layer, and distribution of matgrounds. Geology 39, 1163–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buatois, LA, Mángano, MG, Minter, NJ, Zhou, K, Wisshak, M, Wilson, MA and Olea, RA (2020) Quantifying ecospace utilization and ecosystem engineering during the early Phanerozoic: the role of bioturbation and bioerosion. Science Advances 6, eabb0618. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.abb0618.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Buatois, LA, Netto, RG, Mángano, MG and Carmona, NB (2013) Global deglaciation and the re-appearance of microbial matground-dominated ecosystems in the late Paleozoic of Gondwana. Geobiology 11, 307–17.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cattaneo, A and Steel, R (2003) Transgressive deposits: a review of their variability. Earth-Science Reviews 62, 187–228.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cuadrado, DG, Perillo, GME and Vitale, AJ (2014) Modern microbial mats in siliciclastic tidal flats: evolution, structure and the role of hydrodynamics. Marine Geology 352, 367–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dalrymple, RW, Baker, EK, Harris, PT and Hughes, M (2003) Sedimentology and stratigraphy of a tide-dominated, foreland–basin delta (Fly River, Papua New Guinea). In Tropical Deltas of Southeast Asia–Sedimentology, Stratigraphy, and Petroleum Geology (eds Sidi FH, Nummedal D, Imbert P, Darman H, Posamentier HW), pp. 147–173. SEPM Special Publication 76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davies, NS, Herringshaw, LG and Raine, RJ (2009) Controls on trace fossil diversity in an Early Cambrian epeiric sea: new perspectives from northwest Scotland. Lethaia 42, 17–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davies, NS, Liu, AG, Gibling, MR and Miller, RF (2016) Resolving MISS conceptions and misconceptions: a geological approach to sedimentary surface textures generated by microbial and abiotic processes. Earth-Science Reviews 154, 210–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Desjardins, PR, Mángano, MG, Buatois, LA and Pratt, BR (2010) Skolithos pipe rock and associated ichnofabrics in the Fort Mountain Formation, Gog Group: colonization trends and environmental controls in an Early Cambrian subtidal sandbar complex. Lethaia 43, 507–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Droser, ML (1991) Ichnofabric of the Paleozoic Skolithos ichnofacies and the nature and distribution of the Skolithos piperock. Palaios 6, 316–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Droser, ML and Finnegan, S (2003) The Ordovician radiation: a follow-up to the Cambrian explosion. Integrative Comparative Biology 43, 178–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Droser, ML, Hughes, NC and Jell, PA (1994) Infaunal communities and tiering in Early Paleozoic nearshore clastic environments: trace fossil evidence from the Cambro-Ordovician of New South Wales. Lethaia 4, 273–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Droser, ML, Jensen, S and Gehling, JG (2004) Development of early Palaeozoic ichnofabrics: evidence from shallow marine siliciclastics. In The Application of Ichnology to Palaeoenvironmental and Stratigraphic Analysis (ed. McIlroy, D), pp. 383–96. Geological Society of London, Special Publication no. 228.Google Scholar
Duperron, M and Scasso, RA (2020) Paleoenvironmental significance of microbial mat-related structures and ichnofaunas in an Ordovician mixed-energy estuary, Áspero Formation of Santa Victoria Group, northwestern Argentina. Journal of Sedimentary Research 90, 364–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ekdale, AA, Muller, LN and Novak, MT (1984) Quantitative ichnology of modern pelagic deposits in the abyssal Atlantic. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 45, 189–223.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eriksson, PG, Rautenbach, CJdeW, Wright, DT, Bumby, AJ, Catuneanu, O, Mostert, P and van der Neut, M (2009) Possible evidence for episodic epeiric marine and fluvial sedimentation (and implications for palaeoclimatic conditions), c. 2.3–1.8 Ga, Kaapvaal craton, South Africa. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 273, 153–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eriksson, PG, Sarkar, S, Banerjee, S, Porada, H, Catuneanu, O and Samanta, P (2010) Paleoenvironmental context of microbial mat-related structures in siliciclastic rocks: examples from the Proterozoic of India and South Africa. In Microbial Mats: Modern and Ancient Microorganisms in Stratified Systems (eds Seckbach, J and Oren, A), pp. 73–108. Berlin: Springer.Google Scholar
Finnegan, S and Droser, ML (2008) Body size, energetics, and the Ordovician restructuring of marine ecosystems. Paleobiology 34, 342–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gerdes, G, Klenke, T and Noffke, N (2000) Microbial signatures in peritidal siliciclastic sediments: a catalogue. Sedimentology 47, 279–308.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Geyer, G, Bayet-Goll, A, Wilmsen, M, Mahboubi, A and Moussavi-Harami, R (2014) Lithostratigraphic revision of the middle Cambrian (Series 3) and upper Cambrian (Furongian) in northern and central Iran. Newsletters on Stratigraphy 47, 21–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ghaderi, A, Aghanabati, A, Hamdi, B and Saeedi, A (2009) Biostratigraphy of the Shirgesht Formation in Kalmard Mountains in southwest of Tabas with special emphasis on conodonts. Geological Survey of Iran 70, 28–39 (in Persian with English abstract).Google Scholar
Ghibaudo, G, Grandesso, P, Massari, F and Uchman, A (1996) Use of trace fossils in delineating sequence stratigraphic surfaces (Tertiary Venetian Molasse Basin, northeastern Italy). Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 120, 261–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grice, K, Cao, C, Love, GD, Bottcher, GE, Twitchett, RJ, Grosjean, E, Summons, RE, Turgeon, SC, Dunning, W and Jin, Y (2005) Photic zone euxinia during the Permian-Triassic superanoxic event. Science 307, 706–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hagadorn, JW and Bottjer, DJ (1999) Restriction of a late Neoproterozoic biotope: suspect microbial structures and trace fossils at the Vendian–Cambrian transition. Palaios 14, 73–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamedi, MA, Wright, AJ, Aldridge, RJ, Boucot, AJ, Bruton, DL, Chaterton, BDE, Jones, P, Nicoll, RS, Rickards, RB and Ross, JRP (1997) Cambrian to Silurian of east-central Iran: new biostratigraphic and bio-geographic data. Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie Monatshefte, 7, 412–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haq, BU and Schutter, SR (2008) A chronology of Paleozoic sea-level changes. Science 322, 64–8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Horodyski, RJ, Bloeser, B and Vonder Haar, S (1977) Laminated algal mats from a coastal lagoon, Laguna Mormona, Baja California, Mexico. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 47, 680–96.Google Scholar
Husseini, MI (1989) Tectonic and deposition model of late Precambrian–Cambrian Arabian and adjoining plates. AAPG Bulletin 73, 1117–31.Google Scholar
Knaust, K, Roger, DK and Thomas Curran, HA (2018) Skolithos linearis Haldeman, 1840 at its early Cambrian type locality, Chickies Rock, Pennsylvania: analysis and designation of a neotype. Earth-Science Reviews 185, 15–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lakhdar, R, Soussi, M and Talbi, R (2020) Modern and Holocene microbial mats and associated microbially induced sedimentary structures (MISS) on the southeastern coast of Tunisia (Mediterranean Sea). Quaternary Research, 100, 1–21. doi: 10.1017/qua.2020.91.Google Scholar
MacEachern, JA, Bann, KL, Bhattacharya, JP and Howell, CD Jr (2005) Ichnology of deltas: organism responses to the dynamic interplay of rivers, waves, storms, and tides. In River Deltas: Concepts, Models and Examples (eds L Giosan and JP Bhattacharya), pp. 49–85. Tulsa Oklahoma: SEPM Special Publication no. 83.Google Scholar
MacEachern, JA and Bann, KL (2008) The role of ichnology in refining shallow marine facies models. In Recent Advances in Models of Siliciclastic Shallow-Marine Stratigraphy (eds Hampson, G, Steel, R, Burges, SP and Dalrymple, R), pp. 73–116. Tulsa, Oklahoma: SEPM Special Publication no. 90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacEachern, JA and Pemberton, SG (1992) Ichnological aspects of Cretaceous shoreface successions and shoreface variability in the Western Interior Seaway of North America. In Applications of Ichnology to Petroleum Exploration: A Core Workshop (ed. SG Pemberton), pp. 57–84. Tulsa, Oklahoma: Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists, Core Workshop, vol. 17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacEachern, JA, Pemberton, SG, Gingras, MK and Bann, KL (2007) The ichnofacies paradigm: a fifty-year retrospective. In Trace Fossils Concepts, Problems, Prospects (ed. Miller, W), pp. 52–77. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Mángano, MG and Buatois, LA (2016) The Cambrian explosion. In The Trace-Fossil Record of Major Evolutionary Events. Volume 1: Precambrian and Paleozoic (eds MG Mángano and LA Buatois), pp. 73–126. Topics in Geobiology 39. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mángano, MG and Buatois, LA (2017) The Cambrian revolutions: trace-fossil record, timing, links and geobiological impact. Earth-Science Reviews 173, 96–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mángano, MG, Buatois, LA, Waisfeld, BG, Muñoz, DF, Vaccari, NE and Astini, RA, (2021) Were all trilobites fully marine? Trilobite expansion into brackish water during the early Palaeozoic. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 288, 20202263.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mángano, MG, Buatois, LA, Wilson, M and Droser, ML (2016) The Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event. In The Trace-Fossil Record of Major Evolutionary Events, vol. 1: Precambrian and Paleozoic (eds MG Mángano and LA Buatois), pp. 127–56. Topics in Geobiology 39. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mángano, MG and Droser, M (2004) The ichnologic record of the Ordovician radiation. In The Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event (eds Webby, B, Droser, M, Paris, F and Percival, G), pp. 369–79. New York: Columbia University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mariotti, G, Pruss, SB, Perron, JT and Bosak, T (2014) Microbial shaping of sedimentary wrinkle structures. Nature Geoscience 7, 736–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mata, SA and Bottjer, DJ (2009) The paleoenvironmental distribution of Phanerozoic wrinkle structures. Earth-Science Reviews 96, 181–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mata, SA and Bottjer, DJ (2012) Facies control on lower Cambrian wrinkle structure development and paleoenvironmental distribution, southern Great Basin, United States. Facies 59, 631–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McIlroy, D and Garton, M (2010) Realistic interpretation of ichnofabrics and palaeoecology of the pipe-rock biotope. Lethaia 43, 420–6.Google Scholar
Myrow, PM and Southard, JB (1996) Tempestite deposition. Journal of Sedimentary Research 66, 875–87.Google Scholar
Nara, M (2002) Crowded Rosselia socialis in Pleistocene inner shelf deposits: benthic paleoecology during rapid sea-level rise. Palaios 17, 268–76.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Netto, RG, Tognoli, FMW, Assine, ML and Nara, M (2014) Crowded Rosselia ichnofabric in the Early Devonian of Brazil: an example of strategic behavior. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 395, 107–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Noffke, N (2000) Extensive microbial mats and their influences on the erosional and depositional dynamics of a siliciclastic cold-water environment (lower Arenigian, Montagne Noire, France). Sedimentary Geology 136, 207–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Noffke, N (2010) Microbial Mats in Sandy Deposits from the Archean Era to Today. Heidelberg: Springer, 194 pp.Google Scholar
Noffke, N, Beukes, N, Bower, D, Hazen, RM, Swift, DJP (2008) An actualistic perspective into Archean worlds (cyano) bacterially induced sedimentary structures in the siliciclastic Nhlazatse Section, 2.9 Ga Pongola Supergroup, South Africa. Geobiology 6, 5–20.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Noffke, N, Gerdes, G and Klenke, T (2003) Benthic cyanobacteria and their influence on the sedimentary dynamics of peritidal depositional systems (siliciclastic, evaporitic salty, and evaporitic carbonatic). Earth-Science Reviews 62, 163–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Noffke, N, Gerdes, G, Klenke, T and Krumbein, WE (1996) Microbially induced sedimentary structures: examples from modern sediments of siliciclastic tidal flats. Zentralblatt für Geologie und Paläontologie 1, 307–16.Google Scholar
Noffke, N, Gerdes, G, Klenke, T and Krumbein, WE (2001) Microbially induced sedimentary structures: a new category within the classification of primary sedimentary structures. Journal of Sedimentary Research A71, 649–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pemberton, SG and Frey, RW (1984) Quantitative methods in ichnology: spatial distribution among populations. Lethaia 17, 33–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pemberton, SG, Zhou, Z and MacEachern, J (2001) Modern ecological interpretation of opportunistic r-selected trace fossils and equilibrium K-selected trace fossils. Acta Palaeontologica Sinica 40, 134–42.Google Scholar
Pflüger, F (1999) Matground structures and redox facies. Palaios 14, 25–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Porada, H and Bouougri, EH 2007. Wrinkle structures: a critical review. Earth-Science Reviews 81, 199–215.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pruss, S, Fraiser, M and Bottjer, DJ (2004) Proliferation of Early Triassic wrinkle structures: implications for environmental stress following the end-Permian mass extinction. Geology 32, 461–4.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rodríguez-Tovar, FJR, Valera, FP and López, AP (2007) Ichnological analysis in high-resolution sequence stratigraphy: the Glossifungites ichnofacies in Triassic successions from the Betic Cordillera (southern Spain). Sedimentary Geology 198, 293–307.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruttner, A, Nabavi, M. H, Hajian, J, Bozorgnia, F, Eftekharnezhad, J, Emami, K S, Flügel, E, Flügel, H W, Haghipour, A, Iwao, S, Kahler, F, Ruttner-Kolisko, A, Sartener, P, Stepanov, DL, Valeh, N, Walliser, OH and Winsnes, TS (1968) Geology of the Shirgesht Area (Tabas area, East Iran). Geological Survey of Iran, Report 4, 1–140.Google Scholar
Santos, HP, Mángano, MG, Soares, JL, Nogueira, ACR, Bandeira, J and Rudnitzki, I D (2017) Ichnologic evidence of a Cambrian age in the southern Amazon Craton: implications for the onset of the Western Gondwana history. Journal of South American Earth Sciences 76, 482–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sarkar, S, Banerjee, S, Samanta, P, Chakraborty, PP, Mukhopadhyay, S and Singh, AK (2014). Microbial mat records in siliciclastic rocks: examples from four Indian Proterozoic basins and their modern equivalents in Gulf of Cambay. Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 91, 362–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Savrda, CE (2002) Equilibrium responses reflected in a large Conichnus (Upper Cretaceous Eutaw Formation, Alabama, USA). Ichnos 9, 33–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schieber, J, Bose, PK, Eriksson, PG and Sarkar, S (2007) Palaeogeography of microbial mats in terrigenous clastics: environmental distribution of associated sedimentary features and the role of geologic time. In Atlas of Microbial Mat Features Preserved within the Siliciclastic Rock Record: Atlases in Geoscience, 2 (eds Schieber, J, Bose, PK, Eriksson, PG, Banerjee, S, Sarkar, S, Altermann, W and Catuneanu, O), pp. 267–75. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Seilacher, A (1999). Biomat-related lifestyles in the Precambrian. Palaios 14, 86–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Seilacher, A and Pflüger, F (1994) From biomats to benthic agriculture: a biohistoric revolution. In Biostabilization of Sediments (eds Krumbein, WE, Peterson, DM and Stal, LJ), pp. 97–105. Oldenburg: Bibliotheks und Infomationssystem der Carl von Ossietzky Universität Odenburg.Google Scholar
Sepkoski, JJ Jr (1995) The Ordovician radiations: diversification and extinction shown by global genus-level taxonomic data. In Ordovician Odyssey: Short Papers for the Seventh International Symposium on the Ordovician System (eds Cooper, JD, Droser, ML and Finney, SC), pp. 393–6. Fullerton, California: Pacific Section, Society for Sedimentary Geology.Google Scholar
Servais, T and Harper, DAT (2018) The Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event (GOBE): definition, concept and duration. Lethaia 51, 151–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Servais, T, Lehnert, O, Li, J, Mullins, GL, Munnecke, A, Noutzel, A and Vecoli, M (2008) The Ordovician Biodiversification: revolution in the oceanic trophic chain. Lethaia 41, 99–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Servais, T, Owen, AW, Harper, DAT, Kroger, B and Munnecke, A (2010) The Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event (GOBE): the palaeoecological dimension. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 294, 99–119.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sharafi, M, Rodríguez-Tovar, FJ, Janočko, J, Bayet-Goll, A, Mohammadi, M and Khanehbad, M (2022). Environmental significance of trace fossil assemblages in a tide–wave-dominated shallow-marine carbonate system (Lower Cretaceous), northern Neo-Tethys margin, Kopet-Dagh Basin, Iran. International Journal of Earth Sciences 111, 103–126. doi: 10.1007/s00531-021-02101-0.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stöcklin, J, Ruttner, A and Nabavi, M (1964) New data on the Lower Paleozoic and pre-Cambrian of north Iran. Geology Survey of Iran Repor 1, 29 pp.Google Scholar
Tang, DJ, Shi, XY, Jiang, GQ and Wang, XQ (2012) Morphological association of microbially induced sedimentary structures (MISS) as a paleoenvironmental indicator: an example from the Proterozoic succession of the southern North China Platform. In Microbial Mats in Siliciclastic Depositional Systems through Time (eds Noffke, N and Chafetz, H), pp. 163–75. Tulsa, Oklahoma: SEPM Special Publication no. 101.Google Scholar
Taylor, AM and Goldring, R (1993) Description and analysis of bioturbation and ichnofabric. Journal of the Geological Society of London 150, 141–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Twitchett, RJ (2006) The palaeoclimatology, palaeoecology and palaeoenvironmental analysis of mass extinction events. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 232, 190–213.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Uchman, A, Pervesler, P, Hohenegger, J and Dominici, S (2011) Ichnological record of environmental changes in Early Quaternary (Gelasian – Calabrian) marine sediments of the Stirone section, northern Italy. Palaios 26, 578–93.Google Scholar