Quantitative studies of fossil data have proven critical to a number of major
macroevolutionary and macroecological discoveries, such as the 'Big 5'mass extinctions of …

The rise of arthropods is a decisive event in the history of life. Likely the first animals to have
established themselves on land and in the air, arthropods have pervaded nearly all …

For more than a century, the origin and evolution of the arthropod head and brain have
eluded a unifying rationale reconciling divergent morphologies and phylogenetic …

Recent discoveries of fossil nervous tissue in Cambrian fossils have allowed researchers to
trace the origin and evolution of the complex arthropod head and brain based on stem …

The study of well-preserved organic matter (OM) within mineral concretions has provided
key insights into depositional and environmental conditions in deep time. Concretions of …

Abstract The Fezouata Biota in Morocco is the only Lower Ordovician Lagerstätte yielding a
biologically diverse assemblage in a fully marine environment, whilst also containing …

Meiofaunal life forms are found all over the animal tree of life, and miniaturization seems to
have occurred within otherwise macrofaunal clades multiple times. While sponges, comb …

Understanding the temporal context of terrestrialization in chelicerates depends on whether
terrestrial groups, the traditional Arachnida, have a single origin and whether or not …

Bacteria play an important role in the fossilization of soft tissues; their metabolic activities
drive the destruction of the tissues and also strongly influence mineralization. Some …

The fossil record suggests that chordates might have been minor components of marine
ecosystems during the first major diversification of animal life in the Cambrian. Vertebrates …