An Ediacaran bilaterian with an ecdysozoan affinity from South Australia.

Molecular clocks and Cambrian-derived metazoans strongly suggest a Neoproterozoic origin of many animal clades. However, fossil bilaterians are rare in the Ediacaran, and no definitive ecdysozoan body fossils are known from the Precambrian. Notably, the base of the Cambrian is characterized by an abundance of trace fossils attributed to priapulid worms, suggesting that major divisions among ecdysozoan groups occurred prior to this time.

A new motile animal with implications for the evolution of axial polarity from the Ediacaran of South Australia.

Fossils of the Ediacara Biota preserve the oldest evidence for complex, macroscopic animals. Most are difficult to constrain phylogenetically, however, the presence of rare, derived groups suggests that many more fossils from this period represent extant groups than are currently appreciated. One approach to recognize such early animals is to instead focus on characteristics widespread in animals today, for example multicellularity, motility, and axial polarity.

The mitochondrial genome of the deep-sea axiid shrimp, (Decapoda: Axiidae).

Here, we present the first mitochondrial genome of . The mitogenome contains 13 protein-coding genes (PCGs), two rRNA genes, and 22 tRNA genes. The total length of the complete mitochondrial genome is 16,212 base pairs, and the GC content is 26.

Decade-scale stability and change in a marine bivalve microbiome.

Predicting how populations and communities of organisms will respond to anthropogenic change is of paramount concern in ecology today. For communities of microorganisms, however, these predictions remain challenging, primarily due to data limitations. Information about long-term dynamics of host-associated microbial communities, in particular, is lacking.

Discovery of the oldest bilaterian from the Ediacaran of South Australia.

Analysis of modern animals and Ediacaran trace fossils predicts that the oldest bilaterians were simple and small. Such organisms would be difficult to recognize in the fossil record, but should have been part of the Ediacara Biota, the earliest preserved macroscopic, complex animal communities. Here, we describe gen.