The origins and radiations of metazoans, bilat- erians, deuterostomes and vertebrates have been recognized as the four most important milestone events in animal his- tory and, conversely four of the toughest and puzzling ques- tions in evolutionary biology. Among them, the first two oc- curred in the deep time of the Precambrian and have left little information in the fossil records. Fortunately, intensive investigation into the Early Cambrian Chengjiang faunas in the past two decades have revealed numerous significant data on the main episode of the Cambrian Explosion, par- ticularly information on the various earliest-known deu- terostomes, leading to a much better understanding of the last two events. The “first fish” Haikouichthys and Myllo- kunmingia have been proved the oldest-known vertebrates, and to be among the most primitive ones, representing a key transitional group from acraniates to craniates. Indeed, “Pa- leontological work of Shu and collaborators is revising our understanding of the early evolution of chordates”. Moreover, the discovery of the Phylum Vetulicolia may also throw new light on the origin of deuterostomes. This extinct group with simple gill slits might represent one of the roots in the deu- terostome lineage, as the evidence of molecular biology and developmental biology has predicted. Here the first discovery of tiny vetulicolians from the Chengjiang Lagerst?tte is re- ported. The evolutionary trend from the giant to the small might represent a special adaptation in early animal history. Since all vetulicolians share similar characters in their ante- rior section (pharynx), and on the basis of differences in their posterior section, a new classification system is proposed, with a new class, the Heteromorphida erected. As both the “root” group vetulicolians and the “top” group vertebrates in the early deuterostome lineage, as well as those members in between, such as vetulocystids, yunnanozoans, cephalo- chordates and urochordates, have been recovered, a rela- tively
The Late Sinian (Ediacaran) Gaojiashan Biota was a soft-bodied fossil-Lagersttte dominated by sub-stantial pyritized, three-dimensionally preserved tubular and conotubular fossils. Soft-tissue pyritiza-tion is extremely scarce in the fossil records, especially in the Precambrian, therefore it has very im-portant and unique significance for the study of pyritization in the Gaojiashan Biota. Early pyritization played a pivotal role in the fossil preservation and two main factors ensured the successful pyritization of the fossils, namely rapid burial and permineralization. The former was controlled by secular storm deposition, and the latter was achieved by sufficient supply of available iron from sediments. SEM data of Conotubus demonstrate two types of preservation of the tubes (defined as type A and type B, re-spectively). In type A, pyritization took place relatively earlier and completely preserved both tube wall and coelom, but no detailed structure. While in type B, pyritization took place somewhat later and pre-served the integrated tube wall, but partially the coelom. The size frequency distribution of the pyrite framboids suggests that pyritization took place in two different environments with entire different oxygen content.
Apart from previously reported Small Shelly Fossils （SSFs）, a macroscopic fossil assemblage, comprising abundant algae, cone-shaped tubular fossil forms, and probable impressions of a megascopic metazoan, comes from the Lower Cambrian Yanjiahe Formation in the Yangtze Gorges area of western Hubei Province, south China. The visible fossils are preserved in thinlaminated siltstone or muddy siltstone intercalated between 8-15 ram-thick carbonate deposits, probably representing sedimentary settings of a constrained local depression in the shallow water carbonate platform during the Early Cambrian Meishucunian Stage. The macroscopic fossil association provides significant fossil evidence about the evolution of life from the late Precambrian to the ＇Cambrian explosion＇ interval.
