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Disponível on-line no endereço www.igc.usp.br/geologiausp -51 -Resumo O Período Ediacarano marca o aparecimento dos primeiros organismos macroscópicos complexos no registro fóssil. Evidências atuais indicam que a biota de Ediacara é composta tanto por animais quanto por grupos de protistas gigantes extintos, além de algas e outros organismos sem afinidades comprovadas com representantes modernos. Fósseis dessa biota foram documentados em pelo menos 40 localidades no mundo. Na América do Sul, fósseis de metazoários ediacaranos são encontrados no Brasil, Paraguai, Uruguai e Argentina. Na maioria dessas localidades, são encontrados fósseis do último momento evolutivo da biota ediacarana, capazes de realizar esqueletogênese, tais como Cloudina e Corumbella, correlatos a assembleia Nama. Essa novidade evolutiva surgiu, provavelmente, em resposta a pressões de predação e mudanças químicas nos oceanos. Recentemente, foram encontrados fósseis de organismos de corpo mole, típicos de outra assembleia ediacarana (White Sea), em Santa Catarina (Brasil). Essa ocorrência é de grande relevância, uma vez que representa a única descoberta na América do Sul que apresenta organismos dessa assembleia. Este trabalho tem por objetivo compilar as ocorrências da biota de Ediacara na América do Sul, bem como discutir a importância da inserção e dos estudos dessas ocorrências no cenário mundial no escopo de uma das mais importantes questões da Paleobiologia: a origem e a evolução dos animais na Terra.Palavras-chave: Biota de Ediacara; Metazoários ediacaranos; Evolução dos metazoários; Ediacarano na América do Sul. AbstractThe Ediacaran Period marks the first appearance of complex macroscopic organisms in the fossil record. Current evidence indicates that Ediacara biota is composed of animals, groups of extinct giant protists, algae and other organisms without proven affinities with modern groups. Fossils of this biota have been documented in at least 40 locations worldwide. In South America, ediacaran metazoan fossils are found in Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina. In most of these locations, are found fossils of the last moment of evolutionary ediacaran biota, capable of performing skeletogenesis, such as Cloudina and Corumbella, related to Nama assemblage. This evolutionary novelty arose probably in response to predation pressures and chemical changes in the oceans. Newly, fossils of soft-bodied organisms were found, typical of other ediacaran assembly (White Sea), in Santa Catarina (Brazil). This occurrence is of great importance since it represents the only discovery about its assemblage in South America. This work aims to compile the occurrences of the Ediacara biota in South America, as well as discussing the importance of inclusion and study these events on the world scene in the scope of one of the most important issues of Paleobiology: the origin and evolution animals on Earth.

The early evolution of metazoans has been reconstructed by studies on exceptionally preserved molds in siliciclastic rocks from the Ediacaran Period. However, there remains considerable controversy regarding the formation mechanisms of this unusual ‘Ediacaran-style’ preservation. Proposed hypotheses usually include early authigenesis of minerals, but evidence for this is scarce. In a recently discovered deposit of Ediacaran biota in Brazil, we show that the classic moldic preservation is related to clay mineral authigenesis. Specifically, these clays originated from the alteration of original pyroclastic sediments, likely enhanced by microbial activity, leading to early illitization and morphological templating of the fossiliferous surfaces at a micrometric scale. Such high-fidelity preservation was made possible by rapid burial during volcanic events and the in-situ templating of tissue by clays via microbially-mediated mineralization. This newly described Lagerstätte demonstrates that a number of minerals can facilitate preservation, and that perhaps ‘Ediacaran-style’ preservation result from different processes leading to the same broad style of preservation.

Precambrian filamentous microfossils are common and diverse. Nevertheless, their taxonomic assignment can be difficult owing to their overall simple shapes typically lacking in diagnostic features. Here, we report in situ communities of well-preserved, large filamentous impressions from the Ediacaran Itajaí Basin ( ca 563 Ma) of Brazil. The filaments are uniserial (unbranched) and can reach up to 200 µm in width and up to 44 mm in length. They occur as both densely packed or sparsely populated surfaces, and typically show a consistent orientation. Although simple in shape, their preferred orientation suggests they were tethered to the seafloor, and their overall flexibility (e.g. bent, folded and twisted) supports a biological (rather than sedimentary) affinity. Biometric comparisons with modern filamentous groups further support their biological affinity, suggesting links with either large sulfide-oxidizing bacteria (SOB) or eukaryotes. Other morphological and palaeoecological characteristics further corroborates their similarities with modern large filamentous SOB. Their widespread occurrence and association with complex Ediacaran macrobiota (e.g. frondose organisms, Palaeopascichnus ) suggest that they probably played an important role in the ecological dynamics of these early benthic communities by providing firm substrates for metazoans to inhabit. It is further hypothesized that the dynamic redox condition in the latest Ediacaran, with the non-continuous rise in oxygen concentration and periods of hypoxia, may have created ideal conditions for SOB to thrive.