Nomenclatural status of Orbitolina pileus Fossa-Mancini 1928 (Foraminifera) (junior synonym Palorbitolinoides orbiculatus Zhang 1986) from the Lower Cretaceous of the Himalaya (Ladakh, Tibet)

ABSTRACT

The published literature concerning Lower to mid-Cretaceous (late Barremian–Albian, early Cenomanian) Tibetan Orbitolinidae suggests an apparent extreme high diversity with almost exclusive reference to taxa displaying a complex embryo (subfamily Orbitolininae). The majority of them, among Orbitolina pileus Fossa Mancini described in the late twenties from the border areas of Ladakh (India) and Tibet (China), however need taxonomic reconsideration. The original images of O. pileus are herein interpreted as a mixture of a high-conical mesorbitolinid (of unclear species identity) and a section of Palorbitolinoides orbiculatus Zhang described in the early 80ies from Tibet. The concluding new nomenclatural act considers P. orbiculatus a junior synonym of O. pileus validated herein as Palorbitolinoides pileus (Fossa-Mancini) comb. nov. with the designation of a lectotype. The present study refers to data from the literature and own material from the Albian Langshan Fm. of the northern Lhasa Block of Tibet.

KEYWORDS:

• Larger benthic foraminifera
• Orbitolinidae
• taxonomy
• embryonic apparatus
• early Cretaceous

Acknowledgments

Discussion about issues related to the International Code of Zoological nomenclature with François Le Coze (World Foraminifera Database) and Johannes Pignatti (Rome) in advance of the manuscript preparation are kindly acknowledged. The two reviewers Lorenzo Consorti (Trieste) and Mike Simmons (Abingdon) provided helpful comments to improve the quality of the manuscript. Thanks to Ioan Bucur (Cluj-Napoca) and Mohsen Yazdi-Moghadam (Tehran) for providing images of orbitolinids from the Lower Cretaceous of Romania and Iran. A special thank to Yiwei Xu (Nanjing) for the images from the Langshan Formation of Tibet.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.