Confirmation of an Early Cretaceous age for the Qihulin Formation in eastern Heilongjiang Province, China: constraints from a new discovery of radiolarians

The coal-bearing, alternating marine and non-marine Longzhaogou Group in eastern Heilongjiang, northeastern China, has long been considered as Jurassic, or mainly Jurassic, in age. However, recent studies have demonstrated that the ammonites and dinoflagellate cysts are of Early Cretaceous age. This has now been confirmed by new radiolarian evidence. The radiolarian fauna recovered from the upper Qihulin Formation of the Longzhaogou Group consists of nine poorly preserved species referable to nine genera. Novixitus is a Cretaceous genus, and the specimens of Archaeodictyomitra sp. and Xitus sp. recovered resemble A. vulgaris Pessagno and X. spicularius (Aliev), respectively.