Paleobiology and Evolution: the potential of the Brazilian fossil record

• Autor(a) principal: Soares, Luana Pereira Costa de Morais
• Data de Publicação: 2013
• Outros Autores: Kerber, Bruno Becker, Osés, Gabriel Ladeira, Oliveira, Alessandro Marques de, Pacheco, Mírian Liza Alves Forancelli
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Revista Espinhaço
• Texto Completo: https://revistas.ufvjm.edu.br/revista-espinhaco/article/view/16
• topic: Evolução; megatrajetórias evolutivas; registro fossilífero; Brasil; Evolution; evolutionary mega-trajectories; fossil record; Brazil

Paleobiology is a worldwide known research area that concerns paleoecological, evolutionary and paleoenvironmental studies. Brazil has shown a great potential to the development of research that can contribute to the comprehension of evolutionary history of organisms. Brazilian vast territory holds many paleontological sites that keep crucial information about evolution and diversification of life on Earth. Some outcrops of Corumbá Group (Bocaina Formation) have evidences of first heterotrophic protists and also the following appearing of first metazoans that were capable of building skeletons (Tamengo Formation). Crato Member (northeastern Brazil) is worldwide known for its exceptional preservation of insects and plants and is one of the best sites to study insect-plant co-evolution. Other potential paleobiological field that has been developed in Brazil is paleomastozoology, whose fossils are especially abundant in the Pleistocene of many regions of Brazil and that can shed light about the extinction of megafauna and about its relationship with ancient human population. Therefore, Brazil has a quite complete fossil record that can help modern research, which will try to answer important evolutionary questions including those involving life mega-trajectories.