Insights into the Permian/Triassic transition in Western Tethys: new stratigraphic and paleontological data from the Catalan Pyrenees (NE Iberian Peninsula)

Abstract

The Permian and Triassic successions of the Catalan Pyrenees provide key information on the stratigraphic and paleontological record of Southern Europe. These deposits are encompassed in a long terrestrial succession ranging from the Late Carboniferous to the Middle Triassic, having been historically studied by different disciplines (e.g., Mey et al., 1968; Nagtegaal, 1969; Hartevelt, 1970; Gisbert, 1981; Speksnijder, 1985; Saura, 2004; Saura and Teixell, 2006; Gretter et al., 2015). Nevertheless, there are few works focused on the paleontological record, especially on vertebrate remains. A detailed revision of the known Permian and Triassic vertebrate record of the Pyrenean Basin was provided by Fortuny et al. (2011). More recently, the Lower Permian has been biostratigraphically constrained by vertebrate footprints (e.g., Mujal et al., in press), and the Permian-Triassic transition was analyzed in detail in Mujal et al. (2016). Concerning this latter work, our international and interdisciplinary team carried out new stratigraphic, sedimentological and paleontological analyses from the Permian Upper Red Unit (URU) and the Triassic Buntsandstein facies of the Catalan Pyrenees. We aimed to constrain the Permian-Triassic succession in the Western Tethys sub-basins providing new (bio-) chronologic data together with a general sedimentological revision of the fossil bearing stratigraphic units