The genus Neoglyptatelus Carlini, Vizcaíno and Scillato-Yané has been considered a member of Glyptatelinae, a group encompassing the purportedly basal-most glyptodonts. It is up to now represented by two species from Colombia: Neoglyptatelus originalis Carlini, Vizcaíno and Scillato-Yané, from the middle Miocene (a carapace fragment, isolated osteoderms and postcranial bones), and Neoglyptatelus sincelejanus Villarroel and Clavijo, from the middle or late Miocene (a partial carapace and a caudal armor). More scarce material assigned to this genus was recovered from the late Miocene of Uruguay and Brazil. In this article, we describe a new species, Neoglyptatelus uruguayensis, from the late Miocene Camacho Formation, Uruguay, based on an almost complete carapace and several postcranial bones. We conducted a phylogenetic analysis based on 167 morphological characters (23 new ones and 144 from previous analysis) scored for 19 taxa, encompassing some of the best known glyptodontid genera, one pampathere and four armadillos (including the enigmatic genus Pachyarmatherium Downing and White). In the most parsimonious tree that was obtained, Neoglyptatelus forms a clade with Pachyarmatherium (Pachyarmatheriidae), which is the sister group of the glyptodonts pampatheres clade; consequently, it is not a glyptodont, as previously believed. This result, together with the known stratigraphic and geographic distribution of Neoglyptatelus and Pachyarmatherium, suggests that this new cingulate clade originated in South America and that Pachyarmatherium reached North America during the Plio—Pleistocene. The carapace of Neoglyptatelus and Pachyarmatherium comprises pelvic and scapular shields overlapping each other without separate intervening transverse mobile bands, an arrangement that differentiates both genera from the remaining cingulates.

Ostracods have been recovered from the upper levels of the Pachaco Facies of the Tambolar Formation of the Argentine Precordillera. Four species, two of which are new (Bollia sp. nov., Neothlipsura khiska sp. nov.), are described. An evaluation of the conodont fauna suggests an late Silurian (Pridoli) to possibly Early Devonian (earliest Lochkovian) age for the unit. The ostracod fauna is characterized by the absence of dimorphic Palaeocopina, forms typically abundant during the Silurian, and by the presence of Tricornina, a thin shelled spinose genus, together with representatives of Binodicopina and Metacopina (Thlipsuroidea). The taxonomic composition of the ostracods corresponds to the Assemblage III of the Eifelian Mega-Assemblage or to a “mixed assemblage”, suggesting a deep subtidal environment close to the area of the storm wave base. This interpretation is consistent with an external platform environment proposed by other authors based on a stratigraphic analysis. The presence of ostracod taxa such as Neothlipsura khiska sp. nov. and Tricornina? sp. suggests a faunal link with the palaeocontinent of Laurentia.

In order to elucidate the effect that physico-chemical lake characteristics exert on diatom valve preservation, the taphonomic signatures of the target taxon Cyclotella meneghiniana Kützing was assessed in twenty five shallow lakes of the Pampa plain of Argentina. Fragmentation and dissolution indices were quantitatively related to environmental variables by means of univariate and multivariate techniques (Generalized Linear Models, Redundancy Analysis and Canonical Correspondence Analysis). Valves showed signs of fragmentation and dissolution, and different stages of taphonomic damage were recognized. Dissolution significantly increased with salinity, pH, carbonate and bicarbonate concentrations. Environmental constraints on valve fragmentation were less clearly identified in the dataset. Besides its key role on valve preservation, salinity also accounted for a significant, although lower, percentage of the variation in diatom composition of death assemblages. These results encourage the use of diatom taphonomy as an indicator of past salinity fluctuations in Pampean shallow lakes. Taphonomic profiles can be used to reconstruct past environmental fluctuations, as well as to identify assemblages subjected to significant taphonomic biases. Combining diatom taphonomy and community paleoecology constitutes a promising tool for maximizing their respective strengths while downweighing their limitations.

The Cordobés Formation and the basal section of the La Paloma Formation, from the borehole La Paloma a-186 and the Devonian outcrops of the Chacoparaná Basin, in Uruguay, yielded diverse and well-preserved marine and terrestrial palynomorphs. The palynological assemblages show a clear predominance of marine palynomorphs, with 75 species composed mainly of acritarchs and chlorophytes with subordinated chitinozoans and scolecodonts, and 48 terrestrial palynomorphs species composed mainly of trilete spores and subordinated cryptospores, non-marine palynomorphs and phytodebris. The palynological assemblages enable the constraining of the age of the lower and middle parts of the Cordobés Formation to the late Pragian—early Emsian, while the upper part of this unit and the basal part of the La Paloma Formation can be assigned to the early Emsian. The relative palynomorph abundances throughout the studied samples support the palaeoenvironment interpretation, based on sedimentology and depositional sequences studies, that indicates the transition from transgressive deposits in a restricted platform of the Cordobés Formation to wave-dominated shelf deposits of the La Paloma Formation. The Gondwanan affinities of the Devonian of Uruguay are confirmed by the presence of marine and terrestrial palynomorph taxa restricted to this palaeocontinent. A new trilete spore species, Distaverrusporites steemansii, is described and a new informal acritarch group, the Evittia sommeri-Evittia geometrica Group, is proposed.

Little is known about the recovery of terrestrial ecosystems after the end-Cretaceous extinction outside of the Western Interior of North America, relatively close to the 66 Ma bolide impact crater in Chicxulub, Mexico. A previous report showed that in Patagonia, Argentina, insect damage on fossil leaves decreased from the latest Cretaceous to early Paleocene but recovered to pre-extinction levels within ca. four million years. Here, we present the first detailed study of these Patagonian plant-insect associations, key components of terrestrial food webs, during the latest Cretaceous and three time slices from the early Paleocene recovery. The lithologic units studied are the uppermost Cretaceous portion of the Lefipán Formation and the Danian Salamanca and Peñas Coloradas formations in Chubut, Argentina. Seven functional feeding groups are present throughout: hole feeding, margin feeding, skeletonization, surface feeding, piercing and sucking, mining, and galling. Fifty damage types (DTs) were present at Maastrichtian localities, and 39–48 were found at Danian localities. Plant-insect associations that apparently went locally extinct at the end of the Cretaceous include several gall, mine, and piercingand-sucking DTs. Based on our preliminary leaf morphotypes, host plants did not provide refuge for specialized insect herbivores across the K/Pg boundary. Despite a decrease in insect damage diversity after the bolide impact, Danian floras hosted a rich array of DTs, including specialized damage such as mines and galls. Many of these early Paleocene DTs were not found in the terminal Cretaceous, providing evidence for a rapid recovery of plant-insect associations regionally.