Morphology and distribution of the miospore Teichertospora torquata comb. nov. in the Upper Devonian of Euramerica and Australia

Two previously established Upper Devonian species of trilete, cavate miospores-Auroraspora torquata Higgs 1975 and Teichertospora cuvierica Balme 1988-are discussed in detail and are judged to be conspecific. They are, accordingly, united under the binomen Teichertospora torquata (Higgs) comb. nov. et emend. T. torquata, an eponym of the torquatagracilis Assemblage Zone, is present in the Carnarvon Basin of Western Australia, well beyond its previously recognized southern Euramerican geographic range. Limited lithologic and palynological evidence suggests that the Australian strata containing the species may be late, even latest Frasnian and representative of a younger part of the Gneudna Formation, the lower portion of which has been well-documented palynologically and paleozoologically. Thus, the Western Australian occurrence of T. torquata could be near-synchronous with or somewhat older than its established latest Frasnian inception in Euramerica. The geographic distribution of T. torquata, as currently understood, supports paleoclimatic and paleontological indications of Late Devonian proximity or contiguity between Euramerica and Gondwana