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2.4 List of countries involved in the project (*countries active this year)

2.5 Activities involving other IGCP projects or IUGS
IGCP 406 began as a successor project to IGCP 328 (Palaeozoic Microvertebrates), which ended in 1996, and is helping to bring some IGCP 328 initiatives to a productive conclusion. For example, IGCP 406 participants are collaborating in study of specimens collected under IGCP 328-sponsored field work in Arctic Canada, and IGCP 406 participants (A. Blieck and S. Turner, editors; numerous IGCP 406 participants as authors) are playing a major role in bringing IGCP 328's final volume to completion and publication in CFS. Research on Severnaya Zemlya vertebrates and biostratigraphy continues, and publication of the Russian and French volumes (D. Goujet, editor, for Geodiversitas)on this subject will also further the aims of IGCP 328. IGCP 406 continues to make good use of the newsletter Ichthyolith Issuesand the Paleozoic MicrovertebratesWWW page, both begun under IGCP 328, to keep participants informed and to disseminate project news and announcements. Many participants are also associated with one or more of the relevant subcommissions of the International Commission on Stratigraphy, especially the Subcommission on Devonian Stratigraphy (SDS) and the Subcommission on Silurian Stratigraphy (SSS).

2.6 Participation of scientists from developing countries
IGCP 406 has excellent participation from several countries of the former Soviet Union: Russia (including remote regions), Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Ukraine, as well as from Poland. This year, we had especially good participation by scientists from remote parts of northern Russia. We also have several active participants from P.R. China, who are of great importance for helping to solve problems of global correlation and paleobiogeography.

3. Proposed activities of the project for the year ahead
3.1 General goals
Working group members continue to plan for joint research on existing fossil collections and to apply for funding for field work as appropriate.
1. Final revisions and publication of papers will be completed for a special volume of the Proceedings of Estonian Academy of Sciences, Geology, treating Ordovician, Silurian and Devonian stratigraphy, sedimentology and palaeogeography in the Timan-Pechora region.
2. Other major publication projects, including the special Severnaya Zemlya volume of Geodiversitas, and the IGCP 328 special volume of Courier Forschungsinstitut Senckenberg, will be completed during the coming year. 2. Members of the Canadian Arctic Working Group continue their collaborative studies on Devonian acanthodian faunas (Canada, France) and Silurian-Devonian heterostracan and thelodont faunas (Canada, Estonia) from the Mackenzie Mountains, on Lower Devonian vertebrates from the Anderson River (Canada, Germany), and on heterostracan, thelodont, anaspid, and placoderm faunas from Cornwallis, Baillie-Hamilton, Prince of Wales, and Somerset Islands (Australia, Canada, Estonia, Germany, Sweden). German colleagues continue to study vertebrates