Cythere ikeyanoriyukii n. sp., an extant phytal ostracode genus, was obtained from the Middle Eocene McIntosh Formation in the Doty Hills, western Washington State, USA. It was associated with eleven taxa, which are extant phytal and shelfal genera such as Loxocorniculum, Xestoleberis, Ambostracon, Coquimba, and Acanthocythereis. The presence of Cythere in this assemblage is surprising and indicates that the first appearance of this genus was middle Eocene time at the latest, or at least 20 Ma earlier than previously thought. Cythere did not originate in the Pacific Ocean around Japan as previously thought, but instead must have migrated from the northeastern Pacific to the northwestern Pacific between middle Eocene and early Miocene time.

Gastropods are rare fossils in the Cambrian of Wisconsin. They are usually small and flattened. During the summer of 1978, while collecting trilobites along the western side of the state, I discovered a new gastropod in the Crepicephalus zone (as defined by Twenhofel, Raasch, and Thwaites, 1935; Nelson, 1951). It is a three-dimensional fossil represented by external mold and steinkern. This was the only gastropod uncovered during the splitting of over 200 kilograms of sandstone, which also yielded hundreds of trilobite cranidia and pygidia.

Rangia des Moulins, 1832 is a small genus of mactrid bivalves that is currently distributed in estuarine waters of the eastern United States, Gulf of Mexico, and Gulf of California (Keen, 1971; Abbott, 1974). (One congener, R. cuneata [Sowerby, 1831], was recently introduced to the Antwerp (Belgium) harbor [Verween et al., 2006].) Although these clams are euryhaline and capable of living in freshwater as adults, they require an estuarine-like salinity regime for successful reproduction and recruitment (Cain, 1973; Hopkins et al., 1974), which has constrained their ability to penetrate the North American continental interior through coastal drainages (Cain, 1974; Swingle and Brand, 1974). the Neogene and Quaternary fossil record of the genus is also restricted to coastal or near-coastal marine-influenced depositional systems, with the exception of Holocene specimens of R. cuneata from two archeological sites in the central United States which were obviously introduced by humans (Baker, 1941; Hill, 1983), and a Pleistocene(?) occurrence of this species from along the Pecos River in New Mexico (more than 800 km from the sea) which has been attributed to transport of Gulf Coast immigrants on waterfowl (Metcalf, 1980; Taylor, 1985). Here we provide fossil evidence that the biogeographic history of this predominantly brackish-coastal genus also includes avian-assisted colonization of a far inland lake in the western United States—Pleistocene Lake Russell, Mono Basin, California (Fig. 1).

The capitulum and peduncular armature of Arcoscalpellum toulmini Weisbord are described on new material from the lower unnamed member of the Porters Creek Formation in Wilcox County, Alabama. A few scuta and a possible tergum of a species Zeugmatolepas Withers bearing considerable resemblance to Z. cretae (Steenstrup) were recovered from the same locality.

M. Griffin (Division Paleozoologia Invertebrados, Museo de la Plata, Argentin) and P. Bouchet (Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle, Paris) have kindly brought to my attention the fact that the genus name Taniella Kase (1990, p. 573; type species Taniella japonica Kase, 1990) is preoccupied by Taniella Finlay and Marwick, 1937, p. 48 (type species Natica notocenica Finlay, 1924). Consequently, a new name, Tanimasanoria, is proposed as a replacement for Taniella Kase, 1990. It is named in honor of Masanori Tani, for years of collecting the Izumi gastropods.

The new thin-walled vasiform dictyospongid hexactinellid, Tiddalickia manitobensis, is described from the Ordovician Red River Formation at McBeth Point on Lake Winnipeg, Manitoba. Vertical spicule bundles are an outer? part of the wall and horizontal spicule bundles an inner? different level within the wall. Bundle quadrules are only half the size of those in Tiddalickia quadrata Rigby and Webby, 1988. A complete anthaspidellid lithistid, Aulocopella winnipegensis Rauff, 1895, is described from a glacial erratic recovered from near Reston, Manitoba.

The Murfreesboro Limestone and the succeeding Pierce Limestone (Black Riveran, Middle Ordovician) of the Stones River Group, the oldest rocks exposed in central Tennessee, contain a fossil invertebrate fauna including bryozoans. Bryozoans are relatively scarce in the Murfreesboro Limestone but are abundant in the overlying Pierce Limestone. The bryozoan fauna includes the cryptostomes, Escharopora, Graptodictya, Pachydictya, Phylloporina, Stictopora, Stictoporella, Trigonodictya, Ulrichostylus; the trepostomes Amplexopora, Batostoma, Hemiphragma, Nicholsonella, Parvohallopora; and the cystoporates Ceramophylla and Constellaria. These bryozoans are the oldest known in Tennessee and are the only early Black Riveran assemblage in North America described at the species level. Species of Nicholsonella, Pachydictya, and Stictopora in the Murfreesboro and species of Constellaria and Phylloporina? in the Pierce are closely related to those found in rocks of Chazyan age in New York and Vermont. Species of Ceramophylla, Escharopora, and Trigonodictya in the Pierce Limestone of central Tennessee are decidedly similar to species found in Black Riveran strata of New York. The stratigraphic ranges, geographic distribution, and taxonomy of previously described species from Tennessee are updated.

Murthya, a new ostracode genus of Cytherinae, is proposed for the species previously described as Leptocythere chadopadiensis Lyubimova and Guha from the Lower Miocene beds of Kachchh District, India. The genus also occurs in the Lower Miocene beds of Saurashtra, Quilon, and Thanjavur.

Pandorinellina? boucoti (Klapper) is based on material from the Lochkovian–Pragian (Devonian) section at Royal Creek, Yukon Territory, Canada, where it is found with species of the pesavis and sulcatus Zones. The species is also a rare element in the late Lochkovian–early Pragian faunas in the Toquima Range, central Nevada, where it is found within the same zones. Pandorinellina? boucoti has been recovered from 17 beds in sequence at the IK IV section in the McMonnigal Limestone and shows a morphologic change from a Pa element with a simple blade, small lateral lobes, and an enlarged triangular anterior denticle to a Pa element with ornamented pillars surmounting both platform lobes. The simple blade form is present in beds IK IV 21–16. The next overlying bed yields specimens with a single pillar-like enlargement of the larger platform lobe and a slight swelling on the smaller platform lobe. The following beds (IK IV 14–6) have only morphotypes with the pillar-like enlargement on both platform lobes.

This morphologic change effectively divides the upper pesavis Zone into two segments in the IK IV section. The rarity of this species, however, will probably limit the usefulness of the lineage in refined biostratigraphy and the sequence of morphotypes needs to be verified in other areas. Nevertheless, where present, P.? boucoti should improve the accuracy of correlation in the late Lochkovian and early Pragian.

New and old species and genera of the family Guadalupiidae (spherulitic hypercalcified demosponges of the order Agelasida) are described or redescribed from the West Texas Permian. The entire family is reviewed and observations are made on the epibionts, growth patterns, functional morphology, ecological relationships, morphologic variability, modular structure, and evolutionary history of these largely reef-dwelling sponges. The stratigraphic distribution of species is also noted; many are limited and can define zones. The new genera Exovasa and Incisimura and the new species Guadalupia auricula, G. cupulosa, G. ramescens, G. microcamera, G. vasa, Cystothalamia megacysta, Lemonea simplex, Incisimura bella, and Exovasa cystauletoides are described. Almost all previously published taxa are redescribed and in some cases redefined. The Guadalupiidae are unique among hypercalcified sponges in having a modular thalamid layer (thalamidarium) covered on the exhalant surface by a non-modular stromatoporoid-like layer (trabecularium).

Gordonaster brassfieldensis is a new genus and species of Asteroidea (Echinodermata) described from the Lower Silurian Brassfield Formation of east-central Kentucky. Tentatively assigned to the poorly understood Palaeasteridae, Gordonaster shares much with Ordovician asteroids, yet it also exhibits apparent homoplasies that presage the post-Paleozoic crown group. Available specimens also indicate that the ontogenetic pattern of ossicular addition seen in the crown group was established during the Paleozoic.

The dalmanitid trilobite Kasachstania Maksimova, 1972, previously reported from the Lower Devonian of Kazakhstan and North America (USA) and the upper Silurian–Lower Devonian of South America (Bolivia and Argentina), is revised. Kasachstania kasachstanica (Balashova in Maksimova,1968) and K. septicostata (Maksimova, 1968) are regarded as junior synonyms of the type species K. saryarkensis (Maksimova, 1960), all from the Lower Devonian of the type locality in central Kazakhstan (northern Balkhash). On the basis of a new diagnosis, K. ulrichi ulrichi (Delo, 1940) from the Emsian of the United States, K. ulrichi asiatica (Maksimova, 1968), K. pristina (Maksimova, 1968), and K. alperovichi Pour et al., 2019, from the Lower Devonian of Kazakhstan, K. andii (Kozłowski, 1923) from the upper Silurian–Lower Devonian of Bolivia, and K. gerardoi Edgecombe and Ramsköld, 1994, from the upper Silurian–Lower Devonian of Bolivia and Argentina are excluded from Kasachstania. This genus, represented only by K. saryarkensis and K. kiikbaica (Maksimova, 1968), is restricted to the Lower Devonian of central Kazakhstan, corresponding to the Balkhash–Mongolo–Okhotsk province in the paleobiogeographic context of the Old World Realm, instead of being nearly cosmopolitan as previously considered. In addition, we provide some remarks about Saryarkella Maksimova, 1978b, a monospecific dalmanitid genus largely overlooked although valid from the Emsian of the same area in central Kazakhstan.

The following stringocephalid brachiopods are formally described from upper Givetian (late Middle Devonian) strata of the Selennyakh Range (Northeast Asia): Omolonia antiqua Alekseeva (in Alekseeva and Nuzhdina, 1967) (subfamily Omoloninae), Geranocephalus inopinus Crickmay, 1954 and Geranocephaloides krivensis n. gen. n. sp. (subfamily Geranocephalinae), Newberria gigantea n. sp., and Rensselandioidea talyndzhaensis n. sp. (subfamily Rensselandinae). Broad paleobiogeographical connections between the seas of Northeast Asia, northwest Alaska, western Canada (Manitoba), Nevada, and also between the seas of Northeast Asia and South China are clearly established in the Givetian. In addition, two new stringocephalid-bearing communities are established: 1) the Omolonia Community in early Givetian strata of the Baird Group, northwestern Brooks Range, Alaska; and 2) the Omolonia-Geranocephaloides-Newberria-Rensselandioidea Community in late Givetian strata of the Lower Prianikskay Subsuite in the Selennyakh Range, Northeast Asia, Russia. Both of these communities occur in shallow, quiet-water, lagoonal carbonate platform environments.