Life on Earth had to begin somewhere, and scientists think that “somewhere” is LUCA—or the Last Universal Common Ancestor.

The Cambrian Explosion saw an incredible diversity of life emerge, including many major animal groups alive today. Among them were the chordates, to which vertebrates (animals with backbones ...

Scientists until then had believed that the Cambrian explosion was the point when life on Earth opened out, kaboom, like a starburst of wondrous beasts—elaborate and sizable beings (we call them ...

Imagine a world where the oxygen you need changes dramatically between day and night. Your world shifts from being rich in oxygen (oxic) in the day, so you have energy to hunt for food, to ...

Life was flourishing long before the Cambrian "explosion". The question of how so many immense changes occurred in such a short time is one that stirs scientists. Why did many fundamentally ...

Its end caused an alteration of climate that made possible the proliferation of animal life in Cambrian times There is considerable geological evidence for an extensive glaciation some 600 million ...

Since soon after our planet formed, Earth's 4.6 billion-year-long history was dominated by single-celled life. Something ...

A new study reveals that a region in China’s Turpan-Hami Basin served as a refugium, or “Life oasis” for terrestrial plants ...

Then, at the beginning of the Cambrian Period, life opened its eyes. In the 15 million years that followed the evolution of vision, most of the major animal groups we know today appeared. After ...