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1,000,000,000 years
or
1 X 109 years prokaryotic cyanobacteria eukaryotes (ie internal cellular structure)
Neoproterozoic (Neo:
Newer - proteros:
earlier life) Bitter Springs, central Australia
multicellular eukaryotes by about 800 Ma

92 93

“Cambrian
explosion” Neoproterozoic time
softbodied 1000 to 542 million years ago
metazoans
(Ediacara)

exoskeletonsMulticelled
everywhereeukaryote
fossils
(Bitter Springs)

94 95

96 97

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98 99

100 101

Did Earth have a ring system, causing equatorial shading?

102 103

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104 105

Extended cold spell

Ocean freezing

Lower CO2 + CO2 outgassed by

Equatorial Volcanoes builds up
supercontinent
Increases reflectivity
& induces extensive
ice sheet growth
“snowball Earth”

106 107

Strong greenhouse effect

melts “snowball Earth” results
in “hothouse Earth”

How did photosynthetic life

survive the snowball world?

CO2 outgassed by
Volcanoes builds up

CO2 cycle restarts pulling

CO2 back into the oceans
reducing greenhouse effect to
normal

108 109

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Cracks in the ice allow light Or (more likely) the Earth

penetration and refugia was a “slushball” and
there were areas of land
and sea without ice sheets

110 111

progressive oxygenation of the atmosphere by life itself

the Cambrian extremophile

explosion refugia

softbodied 1st chemical

metazoans Prokaryotes signals
(Ediacara) (Gunflint) (Isua)

exoskeletons Multicellular Single cell Prokaryotes

everywhere Eukaryotes Eukaryotes (Pilbara) oldest minerals
(Bitter Springs) (Jack Hills)

last of the
Fe-formations

112 113

Summary from 1000 to 550 million years ago

1. Eukaryotes and eventually metazoans evolved

2. Several global glaciations
3. snowball versus slushball Earth alternating
with greenhouse conditions
4. Triggers massive evolutionary strides in life
5. Oxygen building up to modern levels

114 115

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116 117

Wedge-shaped beetle Coleoptera: Rhipiphoridae

Rose in Baltic amber Angiospermae: Rosaceae

Millipede Diplopoda: Chordeumatida? Phoresy: pseudoscorpion Oligochernes bachofeni

on a braconid wasp Hymenoptera: Braconidae

Spider web

Close-up view of spider spinnerets showing

silk strands emerging from the spigots

118 119

The cicada Baeocossus cf. The long horned grasshopper

fortunatus with colour pattern Cratoelcana
preserved A cockroach

A draonfly
An earwig
A mayfly
The diplurid spider
Cretadiplura ceara

120 121

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122 123

124 125

126 127

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Why study fossils?

Modes of preservation
• Fossil = remains or traces of a once-living organism
1. Unaltered remains (frozen mammoths; insects
• Paleontology = the study of fossils in amber; unaltered shells & bones)
• Importance of paleontology
2. Permineralization (infilling of void spaces)
– Biostratigraphy (age dating of rocks)
– Evolution 3. Replacement (molecule by molecule
– Paleoecology/paleoenvironmental interpretation substitution)
– Paleogeography/paleobiogeography 4. Impressions
– Simple fascination
5. Carbonization
6. Molds / casts
7. Footprints, burrows etc = trace fossils
Fossils & Evolution—Chapter 1 129

128 129

“Cambrian
explosion”

softbodied
metazoans
(Ediacara)

exoskeletonsMulticelled
everywhereeukaryote
fossils
(Bitter Springs)

130 131

Discovery of “Ediacaran Fauna” (early Metazoans)

Pound Quartzite
575,000,000 years Ediacara Hills, north of Sydney, Australia
or Metazoan Fossils Found in 1946

5.75 X 108 years

Neoproterozoic

Classification: lumped together as “medusoids”

132 133

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Dawn of the Phanerozoic: Small Shelly

Fauna and Trilobites

134 135

136 137

Dickinsonia

138 139

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Dickinsonia Dickinsonia

140 141

Spriggina
Mawsonites

142 143

Tribrachidium

144 145

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Charniodiscus

146 147

148 149

Parvancorina

150 151

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Latest Proterozoic (Vendian/Ediacaran)

Oxygenated atmosphere and seas
Complex, soft-bodied metazoa
152 153

Homo sapiens Homo habilis Australopithecus

era of the hom inids

Phanerozoic time lines

era of Hominid divergence
us
the era of the m am m als

Permian Cambrian
extinction explosion
era of era of the
era of the dinosaurs era of the fish
mammals trilobites

Ediacaran radiation first stromatolites

era of the m icrobes
Devonian
extinction
Precam brian

155

154 155

Cephalon

Hallucigenia (Burgess Shale)

Thorax

Pygidium Trilobite

156
The Cambrian explosion

156

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