The Cambrian Explosion saw an incredible diversity ... external skeletons known as arthropods—the ancestors of insects, spiders, and crustaceans. These toughened-up creatures represented a ...

All animal evolution for the last half billion years has come from tinkering with these Cambrian body plans. Then, between about 570 and 530 million years ago, another burst of diversification ...

High in Canada’s Rocky Mountains, the animals of an ancient ecosystem can be seen battling for life. The fossils of the Burgess Shale offer a glimpse at the incredible diversity of early life on ...

This group includes various species of insects, arachnids ... hypothesized for decades that this group must be older than the Cambrian, but until now its origins have remained enigmatic.

analysed the fossils from key Cambrian deposits. The fossils included Scalidophora, a subgroup of Ecdysozoa. Ecdysozoans include arthropods (such as insects and crabs), nematodes (roundworms), and ...