This Bulletin is the third of a series of Bulletins dealing with the palaeontology and stratigraphy of the Cambrian of Queensland, as well as of Aus.tralia in general. This Bulletin, dealing with the Mindyallan and its fauna, fills a hitherto bl~mk interval in the Australian Cambrian sequence and supplies amplifying information regarding the geological and biological history of the early Upper Cambrian in general. Originally, the palaeontology of 'the lower chert bed' of the O'Hara Shale was planned as a part of Bulletin 53 (Opik, 1961), but had to be postponed for technical reasons; subsequently the early Upper Cambrian stratigraphy was presented in Bulletin 64 (Opik, 1963), and all available information from all geological sources is now included in the present contribution. 1 wish to emphasize that all Mindyallan comprehendable forms so far collected are described, regardless of their state of preservation, but that some material remains indicating the existence of forms which need further collecting. T

In the severi months from the beginning of May to the end of November 1966, the Bureau of Mineral Resources carried out a seismic survey on the Flinders Regional Gravity Low in north-central Queensland. The first six months of the survey were spent in investigating the sedimentary section between Richmond and Julia Creek, particularly to determine whether there was any appreciable thickness of Palaeozoic sediments. The seismic results proved that basement was reasonably shallow and that no appreciable thickness or Palaeozoic sediments can be expected in the area. One month of the survey was then devoted to seismic work near Bowen Downs Homestead, north of Aramac, in an effort to determine the location of the western margin of the Drummond Basin. This work demonstrated that sediments of the Drummond Basin increase in thickness rapidly to the east in the area surveyed.

Legacy product - no abstract available

Legacy product - no abstract available

Lower Cretaceous Mollusca Of The Great Artesian Basin Type In The Gibson Desert, Central Western Australia. Mesozoic Fossils From Eastern New Guinea, (a) First Upper Triassic and ?Lower Jurassic Marine Mollusca from New Guinea, (b) Lower Cretaceous Mollusca from the Sampa Beds near Wan, New Guinea.

Vertebrate remains from Australia were first studied over a century ago by Sir Richard Owen; and thereafter systematic work was carried on only sporadically, until in 1953 the late Professor R. A. Stirton of the University of California at Berkeley came to South Australia and started an intensive field and laboratory study of the vertebrate faunas of that State. He and his co-workers have continued the study, extending it into the Northern Territory as a consequence of finds by geologists of the Bureau of Mineral Resources, of which the Alcoota fauna is perhaps the richest so far. Professor Stirton also paid a visit to New Guinea to inspect the finds in the Watut Valley, first discovered by N. H. Fisher in 1935 when he was overnment Geologist in the Territory, and extended recently by M. D. Plane of the Bureau of Mineral Resources. As a result of this visit, Stirton and the Bureau made arrangements for Plane to study the fauna at Berkeley. Stirton and his co-workers R. H. Tedford, M. O. Woodburne, and Plane have introduced a new rigour into the study of vertebrate palaeontology in Australia, with which the Bureau is happy to be associated. Geologically, fossil mammals are of great importance because they provide a cluesometimes the only clue-to the Cainoloic history of Australia. This volume records work on an extinct group of marsupials which, as the final paper in the collection shows, forms an evolutionary series that can be applied directly to the dating of Australian Tertiary rocks.

Late Tertiary intermontane lacustrine and fluviatile deposits in the Morobe District of New Guinea contain vertebrate fossils in association with dated pyroclastic rocks. Metamorphic rocks ranging in age from probable Palaeozoic to middle or late Cretaceous form a complex basement into which granodiorite plutons were intruded in the late Cretaceous or early Tertiary. From probable Oligocene or Miocene time porphyritic rocks intruded the metamorphics and granodiorite; this activity culminated in explosive vulcanism which produced vast quantities of agglomerate. The agglomerate blocked the drainages, and lacustrine and laterally restricted floodplain deposits formed behind the dams during the Pliocene. A formation, the Otibanda Formation, which includes lacustrine sediments, f100dplain deposits, and interbedded tuffs is formally defined. Its thickness cannot be estimated, but a measured section is more than 2500 feet thick. The type section at 'Sunshine' contains fossiliferous sandstone and mudstone with conglomerate and intercalated pyroclastic rocks which yield Potassium/Argon dates from below the mammal horizons of 6.1 and 7.6 million years. A 5.7 million year date higher in the section is associated with the type faunal locality, which has produced an incisor of the earliest known rodent from the Australian region and new representatives of the marsupial families Ma«ropodidae and Diprotodontidae. The fauna also includes gastropods, crocodilians, snakes, birds, and a dasyurid. Fossil vertebrates have been collected from 21 widely scattered localities.

A collection of Palaeontological paers, 1966.

Some published studies have suggested that chemical redistribution within the earth's crust, can take place during metamorphism. This concept is supported indirectly by a statistical study of chemical analyses of regionally metamorphosed rocks, and directly by - a study of two contact Metamorphic aureoles in the Canberra 1:250,000 Sheet area. Such redistribution provides an opportunity for segregation of original trace constituents of solid rocks, and should be taken into consideration as a possible source of ore in metamorphic terrains.

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