KUNMING, July 12 (Xinhua) - A 300-million-year-old paleontological fossil zone was discovered in Honghe Hani and Yi Autonomous Prefecture, southwest China's Yunnan Province, the local archaeology department announced Thursday.
A rare fossil assemblage of Humboldtia, a genus of flowering plants, and the genus of Keyserlingophyllum in the newly found fossil zone offers new proof of a wider distribution of Tethys Ocean's biota.
The fossil zone expands hundreds of meters along mountain ridges, said Zhang Jiazhi, professor with the Department of Geology at Guilin University of Technology.
The discovery will provide important clues for the study of local geological age, palaeogeography and the evolution and extinction of paleontological species, Zhang said.
