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Ediacara‐type macrofossils appear as early as ~575 Ma in deep‐water facies of the Drook Formation of the Avalon Peninsula, Newfoundland, and the Nadaleen Formation of Yukon and Northwest Territories, Canada. Our ability to assess whether a deep‐water origination of the Ediacara biota is a genuine reflection of evolutionary succession, an artifact of an incomplete stratigraphic record, or a bathymetrically controlled biotope is limited by a lack of geochronological constraints and detailed shelf‐to‐slope transects of Ediacaran continental margins. The Ediacaran Rackla Group of the Wernecke Mountains, NW Canada, represents an ideal shelf‐to‐slope depositional system to understand the spatiotemporal and environmental context of Ediacara‐type organisms' stratigraphic occurrence. New sedimentological and paleontological data presented herein from the Wernecke Mountains establish a stratigraphic framework relating shelfal strata in the Goz/Corn Creek area to lower slope deposits in the Nadaleen River area. We report new discoveries of numerous Aspidella hold‐fast discs, indicative of frondose Ediacara organisms, from deep‐water slope deposits of the Nadaleen Formation stratigraphically below the Shuram carbon isotope excursion (CIE) in the Nadaleen River area. Such fossils are notably absent in coeval shallow‐water strata in the Goz/Corn Creek region despite appropriate facies for potential preservation. The presence of pre‐Shuram CIE Ediacara‐type fossils occurring only in deep‐water facies within a basin that has equivalent well‐preserved shallow‐water facies provides the first stratigraphic paleobiological support for a deep‐water origination of the Ediacara biota. In contrast, new occurrences of Ediacara‐type fossils (including juvenile fronds, Beltanelliformis, Aspidella, annulated tubes, and multiple ichnotaxa) are found above the Shuram CIE in both deep‐ and shallow‐water deposits of the Blueflower Formation. Given existing age constraints on the Shuram CIE, it appears that Ediacaran organisms may have originated in the deeper ocean and lived there for up to ~15 million years before migrating into shelfal environments in the terminal Ediacaran. This indicates unique ecophysiological constraints likely shaped the initial habitat preference and later environmental expansion of the Ediacara biota. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rise of animals occurred during an interval of Earth history that witnessed dynamic marine redox conditions, potentially rapid plate motions, and uniquely large perturbations to global biogeochemical cycles. The largest of these perturbations, the Shuram carbon isotope excursion, has been invoked as a driving mechanism for Ediacaran environmental change, possibly linked with evolutionary innovation or extinction. However, there are a number of controversies surrounding the Shuram, including its timing, duration, and role in the concomitant biological and biogeochemical upheavals. Here we present radioisotopic dates bracketing the Shuram on two separate paleocontinents; our results are consistent with a global and synchronous event between 574.0 ± 4.7 and 567.3 ± 3.0 Ma. These dates support the interpretation that the Shuram is a primary and synchronous event postdating the Gaskiers glaciation. In addition, our Re-Os ages suggest that the appearance of Ediacaran macrofossils in northwestern Canada is identical, within uncertainty, to similar macrofossils from the Conception Group of Newfoundland, highlighting the coeval appearance of macroscopic metazoans across two paleocontinents. Our temporal framework for the terminal Proterozoic is a critical step for testing hypotheses related to extreme carbon isotope excursions and their role in the evolution of complex life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]