New Discovery of Macroscopic Algae Fossils from Shibantan Bituminous Limestone of Dengying Formation in the Yangtze Gorges Area, South China

The macroscopic algae fossils from Shibantan bituminous limestone of Dengying Formation in the Xiadong area, Hubei province were studied. There are one genus and three species (including two new species) and one new macroscopic algae fossils with monopodial branching character (genus and species are unidentified) from the Sixi section. Monopodial-branching type fossil represents the first macro-algae fossil with the monopodial branching discovered in the terminal Ediacaran Dengying and equivalent formations in South China. Vendotaenia sixiense new species and Vendotaenia pavimentpes new species are the algae fossils with branching and holdfast, respectively. The new discovery suggests that the morphology of macroscopic algae fossils might be more complex than previous think, and has the great significance to the evolution research of the early multicellular macroalgae. © 2018 Peking University.