Journal article
The dawn of the Phanerozoic: a transitional fauna from the late Ediacaran of southwest china
- Abstract:
- Animal diversification across the Ediacaran-Cambrian transition was a crucial event in Earth history, fundamentally altering our planet and its biosphere. However, Ediacaran fossil assemblages show limited overlap with those from the Cambrian, obscuring the critical interval when the animal phyla were diversifying. We report a new terminal Ediacaran fossil assemblage preserved as carbonaceous films from the Jiangchuan Biota, Yunnan, Southwest China. This assemblage diverges from co-eval sites, preserving Ediacaran body fossils alongside recognizable non-bilaterians and bilaterian body and trace fossils. These include diverse vermiform animals and the oldest deuterostomes (stem-group ambulacrarians). Our discovery provides insight into the radiation of Bilateria, the most diverse and disparate animal clade.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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- Files:
-
-
(Preview, Accepted manuscript, pdf, 21.7MB, Terms of use)
-
(Supplementary materials, zip, 4.2MB, Terms of use)
-
- Publisher copy:
- 10.1126/science.adu2291
Authors
+ Swiss National Science Foundation
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- Funder identifier:
- https://ror.org/00yjd3n13
- Grant:
- TMPFP2_216964
- Programme:
- Postdoctoral Fellowship
+ Royal Society
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- Funder identifier:
- https://ror.org/03wnrjx87
- Grant:
- URF\R1\221220
- RF\ERE\221057
- Programme:
- University Research Fellowship
+ Natural Environment Research Council
More from this funder
- Funder identifier:
- https://ror.org/02b5d8509
- Grant:
- NE/W007878/1
- NE/W00786X/1
+ People's Government of Yunnan Province
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- Funder identifier:
- https://ror.org/04c6p2s85
- Grant:
- 202201BF070001-016
+ National Natural Science Foundation of China
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- Funder identifier:
- https://ror.org/01h0zpd94
- Grant:
- 42062001
- 42072019
- Publisher:
- American Association for the Advancement of Science
- Journal:
- Science More from this journal
- Volume:
- 392
- Issue:
- 6793
- Pages:
- 63-68
- Publication date:
- 2026-04-02
- Acceptance date:
- 2026-02-03
- DOI:
- EISSN:
-
1095-9203
- ISSN:
-
0036-8075
- Language:
-
English
- Pubs id:
-
2399063
- Local pid:
-
pubs:2399063
- Deposit date:
-
2026-04-02
- ARK identifier:
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Wei et al.
- Copyright date:
- 2026
- Rights statement:
- © 2026 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science.
- Notes:
- The author accepted manuscript (AAM) of this paper has been made available under the University of Oxford's Open Access Publications Policy, and a CC BY public copyright licence has been applied.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
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