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Cambrian explosion, the Glossary

The Cambrian explosion (also known as Cambrian radiation or Cambrian diversification) is an interval of time approximately in the Cambrian period of the early Paleozoic when a sudden radiation of complex life occurred, and practically all major animal phyla started appearing in the fossil record.^[1]

251 relations: Acritarch, Adam Sedgwick, Adaptive radiation, Anabarites, Anabaritid, Anatomy, Andrew Parker (zoologist), Animal, Annelid, Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Anoxic event, Anoxic waters, Archaeocyatha, Arkarua, Arthropod, Aspidella, Avalon explosion, Baltica, Barnacle, BBC Radio 4, Benthic zone, Bilateria, Biomineralization, Brachiopod, British Columbia, Bryozoa, Burgess Shale, Burgessomedusa, Calcimicrobe, Calcium carbonate, Cambrian, Cambrian chordates, Cambrian Stage 2, Cambrian Stage 3, Cambrian–Ordovician extinction event, Canada, Carbon, Carbon cycle, Chaetognatha, Charles Darwin, Charles Doolittle Walcott, Charles Lyell, Chemical compound, China, Chlorophyta, Chordate, Clade, Cladistics, Class (biology), Cloudinidae, ... Expand index (201 more) »
Cambrian animals
Cambrian events
Cambrian life
Evolution of the biosphere
Unsolved problems in biology

Acritarch

Acritarchs are organic microfossils, known from approximately 1800 million years ago to the present.

See Cambrian explosion and Acritarch

Adam Sedgwick

Adam Sedgwick (22 March 1785 – 27 January 1873) was a British geologist and Anglican priest, one of the founders of modern geology.

See Cambrian explosion and Adam Sedgwick

Adaptive radiation

In evolutionary biology, adaptive radiation is a process in which organisms diversify rapidly from an ancestral species into a multitude of new forms, particularly when a change in the environment makes new resources available, alters biotic interactions or opens new environmental niches.

See Cambrian explosion and Adaptive radiation

Anabarites

Anabarites is a problematic lower Cambrian genus, and is one of the small shelly fossils.

See Cambrian explosion and Anabarites

Anabaritid

The anabaritids or angustiochreids are enigmatic tubular, mineralizing organisms with a trifold symmetry (i.e., clover shape) known from their Lower Cambrian fossils. Cambrian explosion and anabaritid are Cambrian animals.

See Cambrian explosion and Anabaritid

Anatomy

Anatomy is the branch of morphology concerned with the study of the internal structure of organisms and their parts.

See Cambrian explosion and Anatomy

Andrew Parker (zoologist)

Andrew Parker (born 1967) (PhD Macquarie University) is a zoologist who has worked on Biomimetics.

See Cambrian explosion and Andrew Parker (zoologist)

Animal

Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms in the biological kingdom Animalia.

See Cambrian explosion and Animal

Annelid

The annelids (Annelida, from Latin anellus, "little ring"), also known as the segmented worms, are a large phylum, with over 22,000 extant species including ragworms, earthworms, and leeches. Cambrian explosion and annelid are Cambrian first appearances.

See Cambrian explosion and Annelid

Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences

Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences is an annual peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Annual Reviews, which broadly covers Earth and planetary sciences, including geology, atmospheric sciences, climate, geophysics, environmental science, geological hazards, geodynamics, planet formation, and solar system origins.

See Cambrian explosion and Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences

Anoxic event

An anoxic event describes a period wherein large expanses of Earth's oceans were depleted of dissolved oxygen (O2), creating toxic, euxinic (anoxic and sulfidic) waters.

See Cambrian explosion and Anoxic event

Anoxic waters

Anoxic waters are areas of sea water, fresh water, or groundwater that are depleted of dissolved oxygen.

See Cambrian explosion and Anoxic waters

Archaeocyatha

Archaeocyatha ('ancient cups') is a taxon of extinct, sessile, reef-building marine sponges that lived in warm tropical and subtropical waters during the Cambrian Period.

See Cambrian explosion and Archaeocyatha

Arkarua

Arkarua adami is a small, Precambrian disk-like fossil with a raised center, a number of radial ridges on the rim, and a five-pointed central depression marked with radial lines of five small dots from the middle of the disk center.

See Cambrian explosion and Arkarua

Arthropod

Arthropods are invertebrates in the phylum Arthropoda.

See Cambrian explosion and Arthropod

Aspidella

Aspidella is an Ediacaran disk-shaped fossil of uncertain affinity.

See Cambrian explosion and Aspidella

Avalon explosion

The Avalon explosion, named from the Precambrian faunal trace fossils discovered on the Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland, eastern Canada, is a proposed evolutionary radiation of prehistoric animals about 575 million years ago in the Ediacaran period, with the Avalon explosion being one of three eras grouped in this time period. Cambrian explosion and Avalon explosion are evolution of the biosphere and Unsolved problems in biology.

See Cambrian explosion and Avalon explosion

Baltica

Baltica is a paleocontinent that formed in the Paleoproterozoic and now constitutes northwestern Eurasia, or Europe north of the Trans-European Suture Zone and west of the Ural Mountains.

See Cambrian explosion and Baltica

Barnacle

Barnacles are arthropods of the subclass Cirripedia in the subphylum Crustacea.

See Cambrian explosion and Barnacle

BBC Radio 4

BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC.

See Cambrian explosion and BBC Radio 4

Benthic zone

The benthic zone is the ecological region at the lowest level of a body of water such as an ocean, lake, or stream, including the sediment surface and some sub-surface layers.

See Cambrian explosion and Benthic zone

Bilateria

Bilateria is a large clade or infrakingdom of animals called bilaterians, characterized by bilateral symmetry (i.e. having a left and a right side that are mirror images of each other) during embryonic development.

See Cambrian explosion and Bilateria

Biomineralization

Biomineralization, also written biomineralisation, is the process by which living organisms produce minerals, often resulting in hardened or stiffened mineralized tissues.

See Cambrian explosion and Biomineralization

Brachiopod

Brachiopods, phylum Brachiopoda, are a phylum of trochozoan animals that have hard "valves" (shells) on the upper and lower surfaces, unlike the left and right arrangement in bivalve molluscs.

See Cambrian explosion and Brachiopod

British Columbia

British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada.

See Cambrian explosion and British Columbia

Bryozoa

Bryozoa (also known as the Polyzoa, Ectoprocta or commonly as moss animals) are a phylum of simple, aquatic invertebrate animals, nearly all living in sedentary colonies.

See Cambrian explosion and Bryozoa

Burgess Shale

The Burgess Shale is a fossil-bearing deposit exposed in the Canadian Rockies of British Columbia, Canada.

See Cambrian explosion and Burgess Shale

Burgessomedusa

Burgessomedusa is an extinct, monotypic genus of macroscopic free-swimming cnidarians from the middle Cambrian Burgess Shale in Canada.

See Cambrian explosion and Burgessomedusa

Calcimicrobe

Characteristic of the Neoproterozoic and Cambrian periods, the heterogeneous group called calcimicrobes are calcareous colonial microfossils, which include many morphologically dissimilar organisms, whose effect in massive aggregations, in association with shelly metazoans, was to lay down the earliest recognizable reef systems: compare Archaeocyathids.

See Cambrian explosion and Calcimicrobe

Calcium carbonate

Calcium carbonate is a chemical compound with the chemical formula.

See Cambrian explosion and Calcium carbonate

Cambrian

The Cambrian is the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, and the Phanerozoic Eon.

See Cambrian explosion and Cambrian

Cambrian chordates

The Cambrian chordates are an extinct group of animals belonging to the phylum Chordata that lived during the Cambrian, between 538 and 485 million years ago. Cambrian explosion and Cambrian chordates are Cambrian animals and Cambrian first appearances.

See Cambrian explosion and Cambrian chordates

Cambrian Stage 2

Stage 2 of the Cambrian is the unnamed upper stage of the Terreneuvian Series.

See Cambrian explosion and Cambrian Stage 2

Cambrian Stage 3

Cambrian Stage 3 is the still unnamed third stage of the Cambrian.

See Cambrian explosion and Cambrian Stage 3

Cambrian–Ordovician extinction event

The Cambrian–Ordovician extinction event, also known as the Cambrian-Ordovician boundary event, was an extinction event that occurred approximately 485 million years ago (mya) in the Paleozoic era of the early Phanerozoic eon.

See Cambrian explosion and Cambrian–Ordovician extinction event

Canada

Canada is a country in North America.

See Cambrian explosion and Canada

Carbon

Carbon is a chemical element; it has symbol C and atomic number 6.

See Cambrian explosion and Carbon

Carbon cycle

The carbon cycle is that part of the biogeochemical cycle by which carbon is exchanged among the biosphere, pedosphere, geosphere, hydrosphere, and atmosphere of Earth.

See Cambrian explosion and Carbon cycle

Chaetognatha

The Chaetognatha or chaetognaths (meaning bristle-jaws) are a phylum of predatory marine worms that are a major component of plankton worldwide.

See Cambrian explosion and Chaetognatha

Charles Darwin

Charles Robert Darwin (12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology.

See Cambrian explosion and Charles Darwin

Charles Doolittle Walcott

Charles Doolittle Walcott (March 31, 1850February 9, 1927) was an American paleontologist, administrator of the Smithsonian Institution from 1907 to 1927, and director of the United States Geological Survey.

See Cambrian explosion and Charles Doolittle Walcott

Charles Lyell

Sir Charles Lyell, 1st Baronet, (14 November 1797 – 22 February 1875) was a Scottish geologist who demonstrated the power of known natural causes in explaining the earth's history.

See Cambrian explosion and Charles Lyell

Chemical compound

A chemical compound is a chemical substance composed of many identical molecules (or molecular entities) containing atoms from more than one chemical element held together by chemical bonds.

See Cambrian explosion and Chemical compound

China

China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia.

See Cambrian explosion and China

Chlorophyta

Chlorophyta is a taxon of green algae informally called chlorophytes.

See Cambrian explosion and Chlorophyta

Chordate

A chordate is a deuterostomic animal belonging to the phylum Chordata. All chordates possess, at some point during their larval or adult stages, five distinctive physical characteristics (synapomorphies) that distinguish them from other taxa.

See Cambrian explosion and Chordate

Clade

In biological phylogenetics, a clade, also known as a monophyletic group or natural group, is a grouping of organisms that are monophyletic – that is, composed of a common ancestor and all its lineal descendants – on a phylogenetic tree.

See Cambrian explosion and Clade

Cladistics

Cladistics is an approach to biological classification in which organisms are categorized in groups ("clades") based on hypotheses of most recent common ancestry.

See Cambrian explosion and Cladistics

Class (biology)

In biological classification, class (classis) is a taxonomic rank, as well as a taxonomic unit, a taxon, in that rank.

See Cambrian explosion and Class (biology)

Cloudinidae

The cloudinids, an early metazoan family containing the genera Acuticocloudina, Cloudina and Conotubus, lived in the late Ediacaran period about 550 million years ago. and became extinct at the base of the Cambrian. They formed millimetre-scale conical fossils consisting of calcareous cones nested within one another; the appearance of the organism itself remains unknown.

See Cambrian explosion and Cloudinidae

Cnidaria

Cnidaria is a phylum under kingdom Animalia containing over 11,000 species of aquatic animals found both in fresh water and marine environments (predominantly the latter), including jellyfish, hydroids, sea anemones, corals and some of the smallest marine parasites.

See Cambrian explosion and Cnidaria

Coelom

The coelom (or celom) is the main body cavity in many animals and is positioned inside the body to surround and contain the digestive tract and other organs.

See Cambrian explosion and Coelom

Coevolution

In biology, coevolution occurs when two or more species reciprocally affect each other's evolution through the process of natural selection. Cambrian explosion and coevolution are evolution of the biosphere.

See Cambrian explosion and Coevolution

Collagen

Collagen is the main structural protein in the extracellular matrix of a body's various connective tissues.

See Cambrian explosion and Collagen

Colony (biology)

In biology, a colony is composed of two or more conspecific individuals living in close association with, or connected to, one another.

See Cambrian explosion and Colony (biology)

Columbia University Press

Columbia University Press is a university press based in New York City, and affiliated with Columbia University.

See Cambrian explosion and Columbia University Press

Complex traits

Complex traits are phenotypes that are controlled by two or more genes and do not follow Mendel's Law of Dominance.

See Cambrian explosion and Complex traits

Concentration

In chemistry, concentration is the abundance of a constituent divided by the total volume of a mixture.

See Cambrian explosion and Concentration

Continent

A continent is any of several large geographical regions.

See Cambrian explosion and Continent

Convergent evolution

Convergent evolution is the independent evolution of similar features in species of different periods or epochs in time.

See Cambrian explosion and Convergent evolution

Coprolite

A coprolite (also known as a coprolith) is fossilized feces.

See Cambrian explosion and Coprolite

Cosmopolitan distribution

In biogeography, a cosmopolitan distribution is the range of a taxon that extends across most or all of the surface of the Earth, in appropriate habitats; most cosmopolitan species are known to be highly adaptable to a range of climatic and environmental conditions, though this is not always so.

See Cambrian explosion and Cosmopolitan distribution

Cretaceous

The Cretaceous is a geological period that lasted from about 145 to 66 million years ago (Mya).

See Cambrian explosion and Cretaceous

Crown group

In phylogenetics, the crown group or crown assemblage is a collection of species composed of the living representatives of the collection, the most recent common ancestor of the collection, and all descendants of the most recent common ancestor.

See Cambrian explosion and Crown group

Crustacean

Crustaceans are a group of arthropods that are a part of the subphylum Crustacea, a large, diverse group of mainly aquatic arthropods including decapods (shrimps, prawns, crabs, lobsters and crayfish), seed shrimp, branchiopods, fish lice, krill, remipedes, isopods, barnacles, copepods, opossum shrimps, amphipods and mantis shrimp.

See Cambrian explosion and Crustacean

Cruziana

Cruziana is a trace fossil (fossil records of lifeforms' movement, rather than of the lifeforms themselves) consisting of elongate, bilobed, approximately bilaterally symmetrical burrows, usually preserved along bedding planes, with a sculpture of repeated striations that are mostly oblique to the long dimension.

See Cambrian explosion and Cruziana

Cryogenian

The Cryogenian (from krýos, meaning "cold" and γένεσις, romanized:, meaning "birth") is a geologic period that lasted from.

See Cambrian explosion and Cryogenian

Ctenophora

Ctenophora (ctenophore) comprise a phylum of marine invertebrates, commonly known as comb jellies, that inhabit sea waters worldwide.

See Cambrian explosion and Ctenophora

Cyst

A cyst is a closed sac, having a distinct envelope and division compared with the nearby tissue.

See Cambrian explosion and Cyst

Deuterostome

Deuterostomes (from Greek) are bilaterian animals of the superphylum Deuterostomia, typically characterized by their anus forming before the mouth during embryonic development.

See Cambrian explosion and Deuterostome

Devonian

The Devonian is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic era during the Phanerozoic eon, spanning 60.3 million years from the end of the preceding Silurian period at million years ago (Ma), to the beginning of the succeeding Carboniferous period at Ma.

See Cambrian explosion and Devonian

Diplocraterion

Diplocraterion is an ichnogenus describing vertical U-shaped burrows having a spreite (weblike construction) between the two limbs of the U. The spreite of an individual Diplocraterion trace can be either protrusive (between the paired tubes) or retrusive (below the paired tubes).

See Cambrian explosion and Diplocraterion

Divergent evolution

Divergent evolution or divergent selection is the accumulation of differences between closely related populations within a species, sometimes leading to speciation.

See Cambrian explosion and Divergent evolution

DNA

Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) is a polymer composed of two polynucleotide chains that coil around each other to form a double helix.

See Cambrian explosion and DNA

Doushantuo Formation

The Doushantuo Formation (formerly transcribed as Toushantuo or Toushantou, from) is a geological formation in western Hubei, eastern Guizhou, southern Shaanxi, central Jiangxi, and other localities in China.

See Cambrian explosion and Doushantuo Formation

Drag (physics)

In fluid dynamics, drag, sometimes referred to as fluid resistance, is a force acting opposite to the relative motion of any object, moving with respect to a surrounding fluid.

See Cambrian explosion and Drag (physics)

Earth-Science Reviews

Earth-Science Reviews is a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Elsevier.

See Cambrian explosion and Earth-Science Reviews

Earthworm

An earthworm is a soil-dwelling terrestrial invertebrate that belongs to the phylum Annelida.

See Cambrian explosion and Earthworm

East Africa

East Africa, also known as Eastern Africa or the East of Africa, is a region at the eastern edge of the African continent, distinguished by its geographical, historical, and cultural landscape.

See Cambrian explosion and East Africa

East African Orogeny

The East African Orogeny (EAO) is the main stage in the Neoproterozoic assembly of East and West Gondwana (Australia–India–Antarctica and Africa–South America) along the Mozambique Belt.

See Cambrian explosion and East African Orogeny

Echinoderm

An echinoderm is any deuterostomal animal of the phylum Echinodermata, which includes starfish, brittle stars, sea urchins, sand dollars and sea cucumbers, as well as the sessile sea lilies or "stone lilies".

See Cambrian explosion and Echinoderm

Ecological niche

In ecology, a niche is the match of a species to a specific environmental condition.

See Cambrian explosion and Ecological niche

Ectoderm

The ectoderm is one of the three primary germ layers formed in early embryonic development.

See Cambrian explosion and Ectoderm

Ediacaran

The Ediacaran is a geological period of the Neoproterozoic Era that spans 96 million years from the end of the Cryogenian Period at 635 Mya to the beginning of the Cambrian Period at 538.8 Mya.

See Cambrian explosion and Ediacaran

Ediacaran biota

The Ediacaran (formerly Vendian) biota is a taxonomic period classification that consists of all life forms that were present on Earth during the Ediacaran Period.

See Cambrian explosion and Ediacaran biota

Edward Lhuyd

Edward Lhuyd (1660– 30 June 1709), also known as Edward Lhwyd and by other spellings, was a Welsh naturalist, botanist, herbalist, alchemist, scientist, linguist, geographer, and antiquary.

See Cambrian explosion and Edward Lhuyd

Electron

The electron (or in nuclear reactions) is a subatomic particle with a negative one elementary electric charge.

See Cambrian explosion and Electron

Embryo

An embryo is the initial stage of development for a multicellular organism.

See Cambrian explosion and Embryo

Endoderm

Endoderm is the innermost of the three primary germ layers in the very early embryo.

See Cambrian explosion and Endoderm

Entoprocta

Entoprocta, or Kamptozoa, is a phylum of mostly sessile aquatic animals, ranging from long.

See Cambrian explosion and Entoprocta

Erosion

Erosion is the action of surface processes (such as water flow or wind) that removes soil, rock, or dissolved material from one location on the Earth's crust and then transports it to another location where it is deposited.

See Cambrian explosion and Erosion

Eucestoda

Eucestoda, commonly referred to as tapeworms, is the larger of the two subclasses of flatworms in the class Cestoda (the other subclass is Cestodaria).

See Cambrian explosion and Eucestoda

Eukaryote

The eukaryotes constitute the domain of Eukarya or Eukaryota, organisms whose cells have a membrane-bound nucleus.

See Cambrian explosion and Eukaryote

Evolution of the eye

Many scientists have found the evolution of the eye attractive to study because the eye distinctively exemplifies an analogous organ found in many animal forms.

See Cambrian explosion and Evolution of the eye

Evolutionary arms race

In evolutionary biology, an evolutionary arms race is an ongoing struggle between competing sets of co-evolving genes, phenotypic and behavioral traits that develop escalating adaptations and counter-adaptations against each other, resembling the geopolitical concept of an arms race.

See Cambrian explosion and Evolutionary arms race

Evolutionary developmental biology

Evolutionary developmental biology (informally, evo-devo) is a field of biological research that compares the developmental processes of different organisms to infer how developmental processes evolved.

See Cambrian explosion and Evolutionary developmental biology

Evolutionary radiation

An evolutionary radiation is an increase in taxonomic diversity that is caused by elevated rates of speciation, that may or may not be associated with an increase in morphological disparity.

See Cambrian explosion and Evolutionary radiation

Exoskeleton

An exoskeleton (from Greek έξω éxō "outer" and σκελετός skeletós "skeleton") is a skeleton that is on the exterior of an animal in the form of hardened integument, which both supports the body's shape and protects the internal organs, in contrast to an internal endoskeleton (e.g.

See Cambrian explosion and Exoskeleton

Fauna

Fauna (faunae or faunas) is all of the animal life present in a particular region or time.

See Cambrian explosion and Fauna

Feces

Feces (or faeces;: faex) are the solid or semi-solid remains of food that was not digested in the small intestine, and has been broken down by bacteria in the large intestine.

See Cambrian explosion and Feces

Filter feeder

Filter feeders are aquatic animals that acquire nutrients by feeding on organic matters, food particles or smaller organisms (bacteria, microalgae and zooplanktons) suspended in water, typically by having the water pass over or through a specialized filtering organ.

See Cambrian explosion and Filter feeder

Fish

A fish (fish or fishes) is an aquatic, anamniotic, gill-bearing vertebrate animal with swimming fins and a hard skull, but lacking limbs with digits.

See Cambrian explosion and Fish

Flatworm

The flatworms, flat worms, Platyhelminthes, or platyhelminths (from the Greek πλατύ, platy, meaning "flat" and ἕλμινς (root: ἑλμινθ-), helminth-, meaning "worm") are a phylum of relatively simple bilaterian, unsegmented, soft-bodied invertebrates.

See Cambrian explosion and Flatworm

Flowering plant

Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae, commonly called angiosperms.

See Cambrian explosion and Flowering plant

Food chain

A food chain is a linear network of links in a food web, often starting with an autotroph (such as grass or algae), also called a producer, and typically ending at an apex predator (such as grizzly bears or killer whales), detritivore (such as earthworms and woodlice), or decomposer (such as fungi or bacteria).

See Cambrian explosion and Food chain

Fossil

A fossil (from Classical Latin) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age.

See Cambrian explosion and Fossil

Fossils of the Burgess Shale

The fossils of the Burgess Shale, like the Burgess Shale itself, are fossils that formed around 505 million years ago in the mid-Cambrian period.

See Cambrian explosion and Fossils of the Burgess Shale

Gastrointestinal tract

The gastrointestinal tract (GI tract, digestive tract, alimentary canal) is the tract or passageway of the digestive system that leads from the mouth to the anus. The GI tract contains all the major organs of the digestive system, in humans and other animals, including the esophagus, stomach, and intestines.

See Cambrian explosion and Gastrointestinal tract

Geochemistry

Geochemistry is the science that uses the tools and principles of chemistry to explain the mechanisms behind major geological systems such as the Earth's crust and its oceans.

See Cambrian explosion and Geochemistry

Geological Magazine

The Geological Magazine is a peer-reviewed scientific journal established in 1864, covering the earth sciences.

See Cambrian explosion and Geological Magazine

Geology (journal)

Geology is a peer-reviewed publication of the Geological Society of America (GSA).

See Cambrian explosion and Geology (journal)

Gondwana

Gondwana was a large landmass, sometimes referred to as a supercontinent.

See Cambrian explosion and Gondwana

Graham Budd

Graham Edward Budd is a British palaeontologist.

See Cambrian explosion and Graham Budd

Great Unconformity

Of the many unconformities (gaps) observed in geological strata, the term Great Unconformity is frequently applied to either the unconformity observed by James Hutton in 1787 at Siccar Point in Scotland,Rance, H (1999) QCC Press, New York or that observed by John Wesley Powell in the Grand Canyon in 1869.

See Cambrian explosion and Great Unconformity

Greenland

Greenland (Kalaallit Nunaat,; Grønland) is a North American island autonomous territory of the Kingdom of Denmark.

See Cambrian explosion and Greenland

Grypania

Grypania is an early, tube-shaped fossil from the Proterozoic eon.

See Cambrian explosion and Grypania

Halkieriid

The halkieriids are a group of fossil organisms from the Lower to Middle Cambrian. Cambrian explosion and halkieriid are Cambrian first appearances.

See Cambrian explosion and Halkieriid

Harry B. Whittington

Harry Blackmore Whittington FRS (24 March 1916 – 20 June 2010) was a British palaeontologist who made a major contribution to the study of fossils of the Burgess Shale and other Cambrian fauna.

See Cambrian explosion and Harry B. Whittington

Helcionelloida

Helcionelloida is an extinct group of ancient molluscs (phylum Mollusca).

See Cambrian explosion and Helcionelloida

History of life

The history of life on Earth traces the processes by which living and extinct organisms evolved, from the earliest emergence of life to the present day.

See Cambrian explosion and History of life

Horizontal gene transfer

Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) or lateral gene transfer (LGT) is the movement of genetic material between organisms other than by the ("vertical") transmission of DNA from parent to offspring (reproduction).

See Cambrian explosion and Horizontal gene transfer

Hox gene

Hox genes, a subset of homeobox genes, are a group of related genes that specify regions of the body plan of an embryo along the head-tail axis of animals.

See Cambrian explosion and Hox gene

Hubei

Hubei is an inland province of China, and is part of the Central China region.

See Cambrian explosion and Hubei

Hydrofluoric acid

Hydrofluoric acid is a solution of hydrogen fluoride (HF) in water.

See Cambrian explosion and Hydrofluoric acid

Hyolitha

Hyoliths are animals with small conical shells, known from fossils from the Palaeozoic era. Cambrian explosion and Hyolitha are Cambrian first appearances.

See Cambrian explosion and Hyolitha

Iapetus Ocean

The Iapetus Ocean existed in the late Neoproterozoic and early Paleozoic eras of the geologic timescale (between 600 and 400 million years ago).

See Cambrian explosion and Iapetus Ocean

Integrative and Comparative Biology

Integrative and Comparative Biology is the scientific journal for the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology (formerly the American Society of Zoologists).

See Cambrian explosion and Integrative and Comparative Biology

International Journal of Earth Sciences

International Journal of Earth Sciences is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published monthly by Springer Science+Business Media.

See Cambrian explosion and International Journal of Earth Sciences

Jellyfish

Jellyfish, also known as sea jellies, are the medusa-phase of certain gelatinous members of the subphylum Medusozoa, which is a major part of the phylum Cnidaria.

See Cambrian explosion and Jellyfish

Journal of African Earth Sciences

The Journal of African Earth Sciences is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Elsevier established in 1983.

See Cambrian explosion and Journal of African Earth Sciences

Journal of Paleontology

The Journal of Paleontology is a peer-reviewed scientific journal covering the field of paleontology.

See Cambrian explosion and Journal of Paleontology

Journal of the Geological Society

The Journal of the Geological Society is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by the Geological Society of London.

See Cambrian explosion and Journal of the Geological Society

Kimberella

Kimberella is an extinct genus of bilaterian known only from rocks of the Ediacaran period.

See Cambrian explosion and Kimberella

Kingdom (biology)

In biology, a kingdom is the second highest taxonomic rank, just below domain.

See Cambrian explosion and Kingdom (biology)

Lagerstätte

A Fossil-Lagerstätte (from Lager 'storage, lair' Stätte 'place'; plural Lagerstätten) is a sedimentary deposit that exhibits extraordinary fossils with exceptional preservation—sometimes including preserved soft tissues.

See Cambrian explosion and Lagerstätte

Late Devonian extinction

The Late Devonian extinction consisted of several extinction events in the Late Devonian Epoch, which collectively represent one of the five largest mass extinction events in the history of life on Earth.

See Cambrian explosion and Late Devonian extinction

Laurentia

Laurentia or the North American Craton is a large continental craton that forms the ancient geological core of North America.

See Cambrian explosion and Laurentia

Lethaia

Lethaia is a quarterly peer-reviewed scientific journal of Earth science, covering research on palaeontology and stratigraphy.

See Cambrian explosion and Lethaia

Linnaean taxonomy

Linnaean taxonomy can mean either of two related concepts.

See Cambrian explosion and Linnaean taxonomy

List of MDPI academic journals

This is a list of academic journals published by MDPI.

See Cambrian explosion and List of MDPI academic journals

Lobopodia

Lobopodians are members of the informal group Lobopodia (from the Greek, meaning "blunt feet"), or the formally erected phylum Lobopoda Cavalier-Smith (1998).

See Cambrian explosion and Lobopodia

Lumen (anatomy)

In biology, a lumen (lumina) is the inside space of a tubular structure, such as an artery or intestine.

See Cambrian explosion and Lumen (anatomy)

Maotianshan Shales

The Maotianshan Shales are a series of Early Cambrian sedimentary deposits in the Chiungchussu Formation, famous for their Konservat Lagerstätten, deposits known for the exceptional preservation of fossilized organisms or traces.

See Cambrian explosion and Maotianshan Shales

Marrella

Marrella is an extinct genus of marrellomorph arthropod known from the Middle Cambrian of North America and Asia.

See Cambrian explosion and Marrella

Mesoderm

The mesoderm is the middle layer of the three germ layers that develops during gastrulation in the very early development of the embryo of most animals.

See Cambrian explosion and Mesoderm

Metamorphism is the transformation of existing rock (the protolith) to rock with a different mineral composition or texture.

See Cambrian explosion and Metamorphism

Methane clathrate

Methane clathrate (CH4·5.75H2O) or (4CH4·23H2O), also called methane hydrate, hydromethane, methane ice, fire ice, natural gas hydrate, or gas hydrate, is a solid clathrate compound (more specifically, a clathrate hydrate) in which a large amount of methane is trapped within a crystal structure of water, forming a solid similar to ice.

See Cambrian explosion and Methane clathrate

Microfossil

A microfossil is a fossil that is generally between 0.001 mm and 1 mm in size, the visual study of which requires the use of light or electron microscopy.

See Cambrian explosion and Microfossil

Microorganism

A microorganism, or microbe, is an organism of microscopic size, which may exist in its single-celled form or as a colony of cells. The possible existence of unseen microbial life was suspected from ancient times, such as in Jain scriptures from sixth century BC India. The scientific study of microorganisms began with their observation under the microscope in the 1670s by Anton van Leeuwenhoek.

See Cambrian explosion and Microorganism

Molecular clock

The molecular clock is a figurative term for a technique that uses the mutation rate of biomolecules to deduce the time in prehistory when two or more life forms diverged.

See Cambrian explosion and Molecular clock

Molecular phylogenetics

Molecular phylogenetics is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships.

See Cambrian explosion and Molecular phylogenetics

Mollusca

Mollusca is the second-largest phylum of invertebrate animals, after Arthropoda; members are known as molluscs or mollusks.

See Cambrian explosion and Mollusca

Montana

Montana is a landlocked state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States.

See Cambrian explosion and Montana

Mount Cap formation

The Mount Cap Formation is a geologic formation exposed in the Mackenzie Mountains, northern Canada.

See Cambrian explosion and Mount Cap formation

Multicellular organism

A multicellular organism is an organism that consists of more than one cell, unlike unicellular organisms.

See Cambrian explosion and Multicellular organism

Mutation

In biology, a mutation is an alteration in the nucleic acid sequence of the genome of an organism, virus, or extrachromosomal DNA.

See Cambrian explosion and Mutation

Namacalathus

Namacalathus is a problematic metazoan fossil occurring in the latest Ediacaran.

See Cambrian explosion and Namacalathus

Natural selection

Natural selection is the differential survival and reproduction of individuals due to differences in phenotype. Cambrian explosion and Natural selection are evolution.

See Cambrian explosion and Natural selection

Nature (journal)

Nature is a British weekly scientific journal founded and based in London, England.

See Cambrian explosion and Nature (journal)

Nature Communications

Nature Communications is a peer-reviewed, open access, scientific journal published by Nature Portfolio since 2010.

See Cambrian explosion and Nature Communications

Nature Ecology and Evolution

Nature Ecology and Evolution is an online-only monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Nature Portfolio covering all aspects of research on ecology and evolutionary biology.

See Cambrian explosion and Nature Ecology and Evolution

Neoproterozoic

The Neoproterozoic Era is the unit of geologic time from 1 billion to 538.8 million years ago.

See Cambrian explosion and Neoproterozoic

Niles Eldredge

Niles Eldredge (born August 25, 1943) is an American biologist and paleontologist, who, along with Stephen Jay Gould, proposed the theory of punctuated equilibrium in 1972.

See Cambrian explosion and Niles Eldredge

Notochord

In zoology and developmental anatomy, the notochord is an elastic, rod-like anatomical structure found in many deuterostomal animals.

See Cambrian explosion and Notochord

On the Origin of Species

On the Origin of Species (or, more completely, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life)The book's full original title was On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.

See Cambrian explosion and On the Origin of Species

Opabinia

Opabinia regalis is an extinct, stem group arthropod found in the Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale Lagerstätte (505 million years ago) of British Columbia.

See Cambrian explosion and Opabinia

Order of magnitude

An order of magnitude is an approximation of the logarithm of a value relative to some contextually understood reference value, usually 10, interpreted as the base of the logarithm and the representative of values of magnitude one.

See Cambrian explosion and Order of magnitude

Organ (biology)

In a multicellular organism, an organ is a collection of tissues joined in a structural unit to serve a common function.

See Cambrian explosion and Organ (biology)

Orogeny

Orogeny is a mountain-building process that takes place at a convergent plate margin when plate motion compresses the margin.

See Cambrian explosion and Orogeny

Orsten

The Orsten fauna are fossilized organisms preserved in the Orsten lagerstätte of Cambrian (Late Miaolingian to Furongian) rocks, notably at Kinnekulle and on the island of Öland, all in Sweden. Cambrian explosion and Orsten are Cambrian animals.

See Cambrian explosion and Orsten

Oxford University Museum of Natural History

The Oxford University Museum of Natural History (OUMNH) is a museum displaying many of the University of Oxford's natural history specimens, located on Parks Road in Oxford, England.

See Cambrian explosion and Oxford University Museum of Natural History

Oxygen

Oxygen is a chemical element; it has symbol O and atomic number 8.

See Cambrian explosion and Oxygen

Ozone layer

The ozone layer or ozone shield is a region of Earth's stratosphere that absorbs most of the Sun's ultraviolet radiation.

See Cambrian explosion and Ozone layer

Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology

Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology ("Palaeo3") is a peer-reviewed scientific journal publishing multidisciplinary studies and comprehensive reviews in the field of palaeoenvironmental geology.

See Cambrian explosion and Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology

Palaeoworld

Palaeoworld is a peer-reviewed academic journal with a focus on palaeontology and stratigraphy research in and around China.

See Cambrian explosion and Palaeoworld

Paleobiology (journal)

Paleobiology is a scientific journal promoting the integration of biology and conventional paleontology, with emphasis placed on biological or paleobiological processes and patterns.

See Cambrian explosion and Paleobiology (journal)

Paleobiology Database

The Paleobiology Database is an online resource for information on the distribution and classification of fossil animals, plants, and microorganisms.

See Cambrian explosion and Paleobiology Database

Paleontology

Paleontology, also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present).

See Cambrian explosion and Paleontology

Paleozoic

The Paleozoic (or Palaeozoic) Era is the first of three geological eras of the Phanerozoic Eon.

See Cambrian explosion and Paleozoic

Parenchyma

bullae. Parenchyma is the bulk of functional substance in an animal organ or structure such as a tumour.

See Cambrian explosion and Parenchyma

Parvancorina

Parvancorina is a genus of shield-shaped bilaterally symmetrical fossil animal that lived in the late Ediacaran seafloor.

See Cambrian explosion and Parvancorina

Peritoneum

The peritoneum is the serous membrane forming the lining of the abdominal cavity or coelom in amniotes and some invertebrates, such as annelids.

See Cambrian explosion and Peritoneum

Permian–Triassic extinction event

Approximately 251.9 million years ago, the Permian–Triassic (P–T, P–Tr) extinction event (PTME; also known as the Late Permian extinction event, the Latest Permian extinction event, the End-Permian extinction event, and colloquially as the Great Dying) forms the boundary between the Permian and Triassic geologic periods, and with them the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras.

See Cambrian explosion and Permian–Triassic extinction event

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences is a biweekly peer-reviewed scientific journal published by the Royal Society.

See Cambrian explosion and Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B

Phoronid

Phoronids (scientific name Phoronida, sometimes called horseshoe worms) are a small phylum of marine animals that filter-feed with a lophophore (a "crown" of tentacles), and build upright tubes of chitin to support and protect their soft bodies.

See Cambrian explosion and Phoronid

Photosynthesis

Photosynthesis is a system of biological processes by which photosynthetic organisms, such as most plants, algae, and cyanobacteria, convert light energy, typically from sunlight, into the chemical energy necessary to fuel their metabolism.

See Cambrian explosion and Photosynthesis

Phylum

In biology, a phylum (phyla) is a level of classification or taxonomic rank below kingdom and above class.

See Cambrian explosion and Phylum

Physics

Physics is the natural science of matter, involving the study of matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force.

See Cambrian explosion and Physics

Phytoplankton

Phytoplankton are the autotrophic (self-feeding) components of the plankton community and a key part of ocean and freshwater ecosystems.

See Cambrian explosion and Phytoplankton

Plankton

Plankton are the diverse collection of organisms that drift in water (or air) but are unable to actively propel themselves against currents (or wind).

See Cambrian explosion and Plankton

Planula

A planula is the free-swimming, flattened, ciliated, bilaterally symmetric larval form of various cnidarian species and also in some species of Ctenophores, which are not related to cnidarians at all.

See Cambrian explosion and Planula

Polytomy

An internal node of a phylogenetic tree is described as a polytomy or multifurcation if (i) it is in a rooted tree and is linked to three or more child subtrees or (ii) it is in an unrooted tree and is attached to four or more branches.

See Cambrian explosion and Polytomy

Precambrian Research

Precambrian Research is a peer-reviewed scientific journal covering the geology of the Earth and its planetary neighbors.

See Cambrian explosion and Precambrian Research

Predation

Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey.

See Cambrian explosion and Predation

Preston Cloud

Preston Ercelle Cloud, Jr. (September 26, 1912 – January 16, 1991) was an American earth scientist, biogeologist, cosmologist, and paleontologist.

See Cambrian explosion and Preston Cloud

Priapulida

Priapulida (priapulid worms, from Gr. πριάπος, priāpos 'Priapus' + Lat. -ul-, diminutive), sometimes referred to as penis worms, is a phylum of unsegmented marine worms.

See Cambrian explosion and Priapulida

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (often abbreviated PNAS or PNAS USA) is a peer-reviewed multidisciplinary scientific journal.

See Cambrian explosion and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

Proceedings of the Royal Society

Proceedings of the Royal Society is the main research journal of the Royal Society.

See Cambrian explosion and Proceedings of the Royal Society

Protein

Proteins are large biomolecules and macromolecules that comprise one or more long chains of amino acid residues.

See Cambrian explosion and Protein

Protohertzina

Protohertzina is a genus of conodonts (protoconodonts or paraconodonts) or, possibly, Chaetognaths, found at the beginning of the Cambrian explosion.

See Cambrian explosion and Protohertzina

Proton

A proton is a stable subatomic particle, symbol, H+, or 1H+ with a positive electric charge of +1 e (elementary charge).

See Cambrian explosion and Proton

Protostome

Protostomia is the clade of animals once thought to be characterized by the formation of the organism's mouth before its anus during embryonic development.

See Cambrian explosion and Protostome

Punctuated equilibrium

In evolutionary biology, punctuated equilibrium (also called punctuated equilibria) is a theory that proposes that once a species appears in the fossil record, the population will become stable, showing little evolutionary change for most of its geological history.

See Cambrian explosion and Punctuated equilibrium

Push of the past

The push of the past is a type of survivorship bias associated with evolutionary diversification when extinction is possible.

See Cambrian explosion and Push of the past

Qingjiang biota

The Qingjiang biota are a major discovery of fossilized remains dating from the early Cambrian period approximately 518 million years ago.

See Cambrian explosion and Qingjiang biota

Rachel Wood (geologist)

Rachel Wood is a palaeobiologist, geologist and Professor of Carbonate Geoscience at the University of Edinburgh School of GeoSciences.

See Cambrian explosion and Rachel Wood (geologist)

Radiometric dating

Radiometric dating, radioactive dating or radioisotope dating is a technique which is used to date materials such as rocks or carbon, in which trace radioactive impurities were selectively incorporated when they were formed.

See Cambrian explosion and Radiometric dating

Roderick Murchison

Sir Roderick Impey Murchison, 1st Baronet, (19 February 1792 – 22 October 1871) was a Scottish geologist who served as director-general of the British Geological Survey from 1855 until his death in 1871.

See Cambrian explosion and Roderick Murchison

Rodinia

Rodinia (from the Russian родина, rodina, meaning "motherland, birthplace") was a Mesoproterozoic and Neoproterozoic supercontinent that assembled 1.26–0.90 billion years ago (Ga) and broke up 750–633 million years ago (Ma).

See Cambrian explosion and Rodinia

Rusophycus

Rusophycus is an ichnogenus of trace fossil (fossil records of lifeforms' movement, rather than of the lifeforms themselves) allied to Cruziana.

See Cambrian explosion and Rusophycus

Saarina

Saarina are cloudinimorph fossils from the Ediacaran (Vendian) and Early Cambrian marine deposits of European Russia and Laurentia.

See Cambrian explosion and Saarina

Scalidophora

Scalidophora is a group of marine pseudocoelomate ecdysozoans that was proposed on morphological grounds to unite three phyla: the Kinorhyncha, the Priapulida and the Loricifera.

See Cambrian explosion and Scalidophora

Scavenger

Scavengers are animals that consume dead organisms that have died from causes other than predation or have been killed by other predators.

See Cambrian explosion and Scavenger

Science (journal)

Science, also widely referred to as Science Magazine, is the peer-reviewed academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and one of the world's top academic journals.

See Cambrian explosion and Science (journal)

Science Bulletin

Science Bulletin is a multidisciplinary scientific journal co-sponsored by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the National Natural Science Foundation of China.

See Cambrian explosion and Science Bulletin

Scientific American

Scientific American, informally abbreviated SciAm or sometimes SA, is an American popular science magazine.

See Cambrian explosion and Scientific American

Sea cucumber

Sea cucumbers are echinoderms from the class Holothuroidea. They are marine animals with a leathery skin and an elongated body containing a single, branched gonad.

See Cambrian explosion and Sea cucumber

Sea urchin

Sea urchins or urchins, alternatively known as sea hedgehogs, are typically spiny, globular animals, echinoderms in the class Echinoidea.

See Cambrian explosion and Sea urchin

Self-organization

Self-organization, also called spontaneous order in the social sciences, is a process where some form of overall order arises from local interactions between parts of an initially disordered system.

See Cambrian explosion and Self-organization

Signor–Lipps effect

The Signor–Lipps effect is a paleontological principle proposed in 1982 by Philip W. Signor and Jere H. Lipps which states that, since the fossil record of organisms is never complete, neither the first nor the last organism in a given taxon will be recorded as a fossil.

See Cambrian explosion and Signor–Lipps effect

Siliciclastic

Siliciclastic (or siliclastic) rocks are clastic noncarbonate sedimentary rocks that are composed primarily of silicate minerals, such as quartz or clay minerals.

See Cambrian explosion and Siliciclastic

Silurian

The Silurian is a geologic period and system spanning 24.6 million years from the end of the Ordovician Period, at million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Devonian Period, Mya.

See Cambrian explosion and Silurian

Sinotubulites

Sinotubulites is a genus of small, tube-shaped shelly fossils from the Ediacaran period.

See Cambrian explosion and Sinotubulites

Sirius Passet

Sirius Passet is a Cambrian Lagerstätte in Peary Land, Greenland.

See Cambrian explosion and Sirius Passet

Skolithos

Skolithos (formerly spelled Scolithus or Skolithus) is a common trace fossil ichnogenus that is, or was originally, an approximately vertical cylindrical burrow with a distinct lining.

See Cambrian explosion and Skolithos

Small shelly fauna

The small shelly fauna, small shelly fossils (SSF), or early skeletal fossils (ESF) are mineralized fossils, many only a few millimetres long, with a nearly continuous record from the latest stages of the Ediacaran to the end of the Early Cambrian Period.

See Cambrian explosion and Small shelly fauna

Snowball Earth

The Snowball Earth is a geohistorical hypothesis that proposes during one or more of Earth's icehouse climates, the planet's surface became nearly entirely frozen with no liquid oceanic or surface water exposed to the atmosphere.

See Cambrian explosion and Snowball Earth

Soft-bodied organism

Soft-bodied organisms are organisms that lack rigid physical skeletons or frame, roughly corresponds to the group Vermes as proposed by Carl von Linné.

See Cambrian explosion and Soft-bodied organism

Spider

Spiders (order Araneae) are air-breathing arthropods that have eight limbs, chelicerae with fangs generally able to inject venom, and spinnerets that extrude silk.

See Cambrian explosion and Spider

Sponge

Sponges (also known as sea sponges), the members of the phylum Porifera (meaning 'pore bearer'), are a basal animal clade as a sister of the diploblasts.

See Cambrian explosion and Sponge

Spriggina

Spriggina is a genus of early animals whose relationship to living animals is unclear.

See Cambrian explosion and Spriggina

Starfish

Starfish or sea stars are star-shaped echinoderms belonging to the class Asteroidea.

See Cambrian explosion and Starfish

Stephen Jay Gould

Stephen Jay Gould (September 10, 1941 – May 20, 2002) was an American paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, and historian of science.

See Cambrian explosion and Stephen Jay Gould

Stromatolite

Stromatolites or stromatoliths are layered sedimentary formations (microbialite) that are created mainly by photosynthetic microorganisms such as cyanobacteria, sulfate-reducing bacteria, and Pseudomonadota (formerly proteobacteria).

See Cambrian explosion and Stromatolite

Survivorship bias

Survivorship bias or survival bias is the logical error of concentrating on entities that passed a selection process while overlooking those that did not.

See Cambrian explosion and Survivorship bias

Sweden

Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe.

See Cambrian explosion and Sweden

Tardigrade

Tardigrades, known colloquially as water bears or moss piglets, are a phylum of eight-legged segmented micro-animals.

See Cambrian explosion and Tardigrade

Taxon

In biology, a taxon (back-formation from taxonomy;: taxa) is a group of one or more populations of an organism or organisms seen by taxonomists to form a unit.

See Cambrian explosion and Taxon

Thrombolite

Thrombolites (from Ancient Greek θρόμβος thrómbos meaning "clot" and λῐ́θος líthos meaning "stone") are clotted accretionary structures formed in shallow water by the trapping, binding, and cementation of sedimentary grains by biofilms of microorganisms, especially cyanobacteria.

See Cambrian explosion and Thrombolite

References

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambrian_explosion

Also known as Cambrian radiation, Cambrian revolution, Cambric explosion, Evolution's Big Bang, Evolutionary Big Bang, Precambrian life.

, Cnidaria, Coelom, Coevolution, Collagen, Colony (biology), Columbia University Press, Complex traits, Concentration, Continent, Convergent evolution, Coprolite, Cosmopolitan distribution, Cretaceous, Crown group, Crustacean, Cruziana, Cryogenian, Ctenophora, Cyst, Deuterostome, Devonian, Diplocraterion, Divergent evolution, DNA, Doushantuo Formation, Drag (physics), Earth-Science Reviews, Earthworm, East Africa, East African Orogeny, Echinoderm, Ecological niche, Ectoderm, Ediacaran, Ediacaran biota, Edward Lhuyd, Electron, Embryo, Endoderm, Entoprocta, Erosion, Eucestoda, Eukaryote, Evolution of the eye, Evolutionary arms race, Evolutionary developmental biology, Evolutionary radiation, Exoskeleton, Fauna, Feces, Filter feeder, Fish, Flatworm, Flowering plant, Food chain, Fossil, Fossils of the Burgess Shale, Gastrointestinal tract, Geochemistry, Geological Magazine, Geology (journal), Gondwana, Graham Budd, Great Unconformity, Greenland, Grypania, Halkieriid, Harry B. Whittington, Helcionelloida, History of life, Horizontal gene transfer, Hox gene, Hubei, Hydrofluoric acid, Hyolitha, Iapetus Ocean, Integrative and Comparative Biology, International Journal of Earth Sciences, Jellyfish, Journal of African Earth Sciences, Journal of Paleontology, Journal of the Geological Society, Kimberella, Kingdom (biology), Lagerstätte, Late Devonian extinction, Laurentia, Lethaia, Linnaean taxonomy, List of MDPI academic journals, Lobopodia, Lumen (anatomy), Maotianshan Shales, Marrella, Mesoderm, Metamorphism, Methane clathrate, Microfossil, Microorganism, Molecular clock, Molecular phylogenetics, Mollusca, Montana, Mount Cap formation, Multicellular organism, Mutation, Namacalathus, Natural selection, Nature (journal), Nature Communications, Nature Ecology and Evolution, Neoproterozoic, Niles Eldredge, Notochord, On the Origin of Species, Opabinia, Order of magnitude, Organ (biology), Orogeny, Orsten, Oxford University Museum of Natural History, Oxygen, Ozone layer, Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, Palaeoworld, Paleobiology (journal), Paleobiology Database, Paleontology, Paleozoic, Parenchyma, Parvancorina, Peritoneum, Permian–Triassic extinction event, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, Phoronid, Photosynthesis, Phylum, Physics, Phytoplankton, Plankton, Planula, Polytomy, Precambrian Research, Predation, Preston Cloud, Priapulida, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Proceedings of the Royal Society, Protein, Protohertzina, Proton, Protostome, Punctuated equilibrium, Push of the past, Qingjiang biota, Rachel Wood (geologist), Radiometric dating, Roderick Murchison, Rodinia, Rusophycus, Saarina, Scalidophora, Scavenger, Science (journal), Science Bulletin, Scientific American, Sea cucumber, Sea urchin, Self-organization, Signor–Lipps effect, Siliciclastic, Silurian, Sinotubulites, Sirius Passet, Skolithos, Small shelly fauna, Snowball Earth, Soft-bodied organism, Spider, Sponge, Spriggina, Starfish, Stephen Jay Gould, Stromatolite, Survivorship bias, Sweden, Tardigrade, Taxon, Thrombolite, Tommotiid, Trace fossil, Trilobite, Triploblasty, United States Geological Survey, Vernanimalcula, Warrawoona, William Buckland, Wiwaxia, Wonderful Life (book), Yilingia, Yunnan.

Cambrian explosion, the Glossary

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