What is the PalyAtlas ?

The PalyAtlas series is intended as a current and detailed guide to biostratigraphically useful palynomorph species from specific geologic intervals and regions of offshore eastern Canada. Being digital and output as open files, PalyAtlases are not formal publications, and so taxonomic nomenclature used in it must be considered informal (formal publications are intended to follow, where time permits). However, they do contain up-to-date ideas on taxonomy, as well as hundreds of thumbnail-ready illustrations, references and a glossary of terms relating to fossil dinoflagellates.

The first PalyAtlas, that for mid Cretaceous to Neogene dinoflagellates for the Scotian Margin, is now available from the Geological Survey of Canada (Atlantic). Future plans involve placing all PalyAtlas contents on the web for free access.

Why a PalyAtlas ?

Over the years geologists and geophysicists working on the offshore eastern Canada sedimentary basins have constantly needed age control, and hence there has been pressure on biostratigraphers to "run wells". Such activity remains our priority, but to meet the demand for increasingly detailed and consistent age control we need an efficient means to take care of the "tools of the trade" (our taxonomic concepts and refined stratigraphic ranges based on these). We must also communicate these concepts efficiently and effectively. For example (to take a famous dinosaur name in vain to illustrate the problem), the concept embodied in the name Tyrannosaurus rex is only meaningful and useful if everyone working on, or referring to that gigantic beast has the same idea of what a Tyrannosaurus rex is. While many offshore wells have been analyzed biostratigraphically, supporting documentation of the taxonomic concepts followed has been minimal. The PalyAtlas series is intended to serve this purpose of stabilizing and communicating taxonomic concepts through descriptions and, especially, illustrations.