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Patricia Gensel
Patricia Gensel of the University of North Carolina has been looking into the geological past of New Brunswick for many years. Dr. Gensel studies ancient land plants. She was drawn to northern New Brunswick by the significant fossil localities first described in detail by William Dawson in the 1800s. Fossils from New Brunswick have made an important contribution to the understanding of how plants became established on land. And not just plants, since living among the vegetation the earliest land animals were also establishing themselves on land. Gensel’s work has included reports on the oldest land animals in North America found near Dalhousie. Scorpions, millipedes and the millipede-like Eoarthropleura were living along the Devonian shore amongst the vegetation. Fossil millipede specialist Heather Wilson named one of the fossils found in New Brunswick Gaspestria genselorum.
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