Prof. Carl Brett from the University of Cincinnati was invited to visit NIGPAS in November 2016 by Prof. ZHAN Renbin. He composed a short course focused on the taphonomy and sequence stratigraphy for graduate students and young researchers of NIGPAS and Nanjing University. During his visit, accompanied by Prof. ZHAN and his colleagues, Prof. Brett also went to central and southwestern China to visit some classical Lower Paleozoic sections.