This site is located on Maotian Mountain in Chengjiang County, Yuxi City, Yunnan Province, and it has an area of 5.1 km2. It contains the most complete record of marine life in the early Cambrian. The well-preserved biota include hard and soft tissue structures of many living organisms, such as the invertebrates and vertebrates. These fossils document the early development of the complex marine ecosystems. The Chengjiang Fossil Heritage Site contains at least 16 phyla, many unexplored biomes and 196 species, providing an excellent evidence of the rapid and diverse evolution of life over 530 million years ago. Most of the major fauna that survive today can be found in the fossils from this period. The heritage site is a significant window for the study of palaeontology.
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(2020). Chengjiang Fossil Site, China. In: Chen, A., Ng, Y., Zhang, E., Tian, M. (eds) Dictionary of Geotourism. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-2538-0_296
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-2538-0_296
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