Distribution of Ediacaran acanthomorphic acritarchs in the lower Doushantuo Formation of the Yangtze Gorges area, South China: Evolutionary and stratigraphic implications

•Distribution of spiny acritarchs from the lower Doushantuo Formation in the Yangtze Gorges area is reported.•Eukaryotes diversified within about 10 Myrs after the Marinoan deglaciation.•Fifteen new acanthomorphic forms are recognized and systematically described. As part of the most common eukaryotic fossils in early Ediacaran strata, acanthomorphic acritarchs are crucial for understanding the biostratigraphy and evolutionary dynamics of marine eukaryotes after the Marinoan global glaciation. Abundant and diverse acanthomorphic acritarchs have been reported from the Ediacaran Doushantuo Formation in the Yangtze Gorges area, South China, and different biozonation schemes have been proposed. However, these previously published biozones were based on biostratigraphic data compiled from different stratigraphic sections, with little effort to test whether these biozones can be consistently recognized at different sections, despite the fact that regional consistency is critical to a robust biostratigraphic framework. Also, the evolutionary pattern of the Doushantuo acritarchs has not been documented in detail, especially for acritarchs from the lowermost Doushantuo Formation, largely due to the perceived low taxonomic richness after the Marinoan global glaciation. In this study, we report silicified acanthomorphic acritarchs and other eukaryotic microfossils from chert nodules in the lower part (Member II) of the Doushantuo Formation at the Jiulongwan, Jinguadun, and Wuzhishan sections in the Yangtze Gorges area. From a total of 1547 acanthomorphic acritarch specimens found, 24 genera and 69 species have been identified, including two new genera (Annularidens gen. nov. and Crassimembrana gen. nov.), six new species (Annularidens inconditus gen. et sp. nov., Bispinosphaera vacua sp. nov., Crassimembrana crispans gen. et sp. nov., C. multitunica gen. et sp. nov., Distosphaera jinguadunensis sp. nov., and Mengeosphaera matryoshkaformis sp. nov.), five unnamed species (Annularidens sp., Mengeosphaera sp. 1, Mengeosphaera sp. 2, Sinosphaera sp., and Variomargosphaeridium sp.), and three possible new forms tentatively placed in open nomenclatures (Crassimembrana cf. C. crispans, Tanarium cf. T. conoideum, and Weissiella cf. W. grandistella). The high-resolution fossil occurrence and abundance data from the three sections reveal both spatial variations in acritarch composition, and stratigraphic similarities in acanthomorph range and abundance, indicating that acantho