New hyolith specimens from the early Cambrian (Stage 4) of the Three Gorges area, western Hubei Province are described and assigned to the species . are preserved in two taphonomic modes: casts in silty mudstone revealing gross morphology and some soft parts, and internal molds in calcareous pelites, which exhibit new morphological details of the conch and operculum. SEM and Micro-CT analyses show that preserve well-developed platy clavicles and cardinal processes on the interior of the operculum composed of rod-shaped tubular elements. This observation and the distinct cardinal and conical shields of the operculum indicate that could be placed within the Family Paramicrocornidae, most recently established as a group of hyoliths closely related to hyolithids.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/biology11060875 | DOI Listing |
Sci Adv
January 2025
State Key Laboratory of Continental Dynamics, Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Early Life & Environments and Department of Geology, Northwest University, Xi'an, China.
Ecdysozoan worms (Nematoida + Scalidophora) are typified by disparate grades of neural organization reflecting a complex evolutionary history. The fossil record offers a unique opportunity to reconstruct the early character evolution of the nervous system via the exceptional preservation of extinct representatives. We focus on their nervous system as it appears in early and mid-Cambrian fossils.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Physiol
January 2025
Department of Ophthalmology, Stein Eye Institute, UCLA School of Medicine, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
Bipolar cells are vertebrate retinal interneurons conveying signals from rod and cone photoreceptors to amacrine and ganglion cells. Bipolar cells are found in all vertebrates and have many structural and molecular affinities with photoreceptors; they probably appeared very early during vertebrate evolution in conjunction with rod and cone progenitors. There are two types of bipolar cells, responding to central illumination with depolarization (ON) or hyperpolarization (OFF).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCurr Biol
December 2024
Palaeoscience Research Centre, School of Environmental and Rural Science, University of New England, Armidale, NSW 2351, Australia.
Predation is an important driver of species-level change in modern and fossil ecosystems, often through selection for defensive phenotypes in prey responding to predation pressures over time. Records of changes in shell morphology and injury patterns in biomineralized taxa are ideal for demonstrating such adaptive responses. The rapid increase in diversity and abundance of biomineralizing organisms during the early Cambrian is often attributed to predation and an evolutionary arms race.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCurr Biol
December 2024
School of the Environment and Life Sciences, University of Portsmouth, Burnaby Road, Portsmouth PO1 3QL, UK.
The Cambrian explosion was a time of groundbreaking ecological shifts related to the establishment of the Phanerozoic biosphere. Trace fossils, which are the products of animals interacting with their substrates, provide a key record of the diversification of the benthos and the evolution of behavioral complexity through this interval. The Chapel Island Formation of Newfoundland in Canada hosts the most extensive trace-fossil record from the latest Ediacaran to Cambrian Age 2, spanning about 20 million years continuously.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFScience
December 2024
Department of Geosciences and Global Change Center, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA.
The global diversity of Proterozoic eukaryote fossils is poorly quantified despite its fundamental importance to the understanding of macroevolutionary patterns and dynamics on the early Earth. Here we report a new construction of fossil eukaryote diversity from the Paleoproterozoic to early Cambrian based on a comprehensive data compilation and quantitative analyses. The resulting taxonomic richness curve verifies Cryogenian glaciations as a major divide that separates the "Boring Billion" and Ediacaran periods, with the former characterized by a prolonged stasis, and the latter by greater diversity, more-rapid turnover, and multiple radiations and extinctions.
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