The end-Permian mass extinction is the most severe mass extinction event ever recorded, during which ~80% of marine species went extinct.
Earth Sciences
Jun 21, 2022
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Paleontologists in the U.K. and China have shown that the natural world bounced back vigorously following the End-Permian Extinction.
Evolution
Jun 20, 2022
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For decades, paleontologists have debated whether dinosaurs were warm-blooded, like modern mammals and birds, or cold-blooded, like modern reptiles. Knowing whether dinosaurs were warm- or cold-blooded could give us hints ...
Paleontology & Fossils
May 25, 2022
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Early animals formed complex ecological communities more than 550 million years ago, setting the evolutionary stage for the Cambrian explosion, according to a study by Rebecca Eden, Emily Mitchell, and colleagues at the University ...
Ecology
May 17, 2022
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What turned Venus into hell? It could have simply been a steadily warming sun, but new research suggests that volcanoes may have played a role in creating a runaway greenhouse effect. And the same history of active Volcanism ...
Planetary Sciences
May 09, 2022
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Prehistoric mammals bulked up, rather than develop bigger brains, to boost their survival chances once dinosaurs had become extinct, research suggests.
Evolution
Mar 31, 2022
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Mammals with larger brains than similar-sized related species were more likely to have survived extinction during the Late Quaternary (between 115,000 to 500 years ago) reports a study published in Scientific Reports.
Evolution
Mar 31, 2022
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346
Lacewings (Neuroptera) are small predatory insects, whose larvae are sometimes used as pest control agents in agriculture. Few non-specialists, however, know that some lacewings can look a lot like praying mantises.
Paleontology & Fossils
Mar 22, 2022
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Curtin research has revealed that soil erosion and wildfires contributed to a mass extinction event 201 million years ago that ended the Triassic era and paved the way for the rise of dinosaurs in the Jurassic period.
Earth Sciences
Mar 21, 2022
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39
Palaeobiologists from the University of Tübingen have described a previously unknown turtle species that lived in what is now Romania some 70 million years ago. The reptile, measuring 19 cm in length, has no close relatives ...
Paleontology & Fossils
Mar 02, 2022
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An extinction event (also known as: mass extinction; extinction-level event, ELE) is a sharp decrease in the number of species in a relatively short period of time. Mass extinctions affect most major taxonomic groups present at the time — birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, fish, invertebrates and other simpler life forms. They may be caused by one or both of:
Over 99% of species that ever lived are now extinct, but extinction occurs at an uneven rate. Based on the fossil record, the background rate of extinctions on Earth is about two to five taxonomic families of marine invertebrates and vertebrates every million years. Marine fossils are mostly used to measure extinction rates because they are more plentiful and cover a longer time span than fossils of land organisms.
Since life began on earth, several major mass extinctions have significantly exceeded the background extinction rate. The most recent, the Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction event, occurred 65 million years ago, and has attracted more attention than all others as it marks the extinction of nearly all dinosaur species, which were the dominant animal class of the period. In the past 540 million years there have been five major events when over 50% of animal species died. There probably were mass extinctions in the Archean and Proterozoic Eons, but before the Phanerozoic there were no animals with hard body parts to leave a significant fossil record.
Estimates of the number of major mass extinctions in the last 540 million years range from as few as five to more than twenty. These differences stem from the threshold chosen for describing an extinction event as "major", and the data chosen to measure past diversity.
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