几乎所有动物祖先站在同一起跑线上——5．3亿年前化石揭秘“寒武纪生命大爆发”

"寒武纪大爆发"是一个令达尔文都感到困惑的问题,在人们普遍认同达尔文进化论的今天,全面揭示并合理解释"寒武纪大爆发"的真实面貌、探索众多动物门类起源的难题仍然摆在人们面前.

Causes and consequences of the Cambrian explosion

The Cambrian explosion has long been a basic research frontier that concerns many scientific fields. Here we discuss the cause-effect links of the Cambrian explosion on the basis of first appearances of animal phyla in the fossil record, divergence time, environmental changes, Gene Regulatory Networks, and ecological feedbacks. The first appearances of phyla in the fos- sil record are obviously diachronous but relatively abrupt, concentrated in the first three stages of the Cambrian period （541- 514 Ma）. The actual divergence time may be deep or shallow. Since the gene regulatory networks （GRNs） that control the de- velopment of metazoans were in place before the divergence, the establishment of GRNs is necessary but insufficient for the Cambrian explosion. Thus the Cambrian explosion required environmental triggers. Nutrient availability, oxygenation, and change of seawater composition were potential environmental triggers. The nutrient input, e.g., the phosphorus enrichment in the environment, would cause excess primary production, but it is not directly linked with diversity or disparity. Further in- crease of oxygen level and change of seawater composition during the Ediacaran-Cambrian transition were probably crucial environmental factors that caused the Cambrian explosion, but more detailed geochemical data are required. Many researchers prefer that the Cambrian explosion is an ecological phenomenon, that is, the unprecedented ecological success of ruetazoans during the Early Cambrian, but ecological effects need diverse and abundant animals. Therefore, the establishment of the eco- logical complexity among animals, and between animals and environments, is a consequence rather than a cause of the Cam- brian explosion. It is no doubt that positive ecological feedbacks could facilitate the increase of biodiversity. In a word, the Cambrian explosion happened when environmental changes crossed critical thresholds, led to the initial formation of the meta- zoan-doruinated ecosystem through a series of knock-on ecological processes, i.e., ＂ecological snowball＂ effects.

Spatiotemporal variability of ocean chemistry in the early Cambrian,South China

Following the Ediacaran metazoan radiation,the "Cambrian Explosion" set up the major framework of todays' animal phyla as well as modern marine ecosystem.Here,we present a preliminary investigation on the temporal and spatial(from shallow to deep waters) variations of the early Cambrian ocean chemistry in South China through analyzing a Fe-S-C systematic dataset integrated from literature.Our investigation indicates that the early Cambrian deep ocean in South China was still anoxic and Fe2+-enriched(i.e.,ferruginous) although its surface was oxic,and in between a metastable euxinic(anoxic and sulfidic) water zone may have dynamically developed in anoxic shelf waters with an increasing weathering sulfate supply.Furthermore,accompanying marine transgression and regression cycles in the early Cambrian,such a "sandwich" structure in ocean redox chemistry demonstrates five evolutional stages,which can be well correlated to the spatiotemporal patterns of fossil records in South China.The good correlation between metazoan fossil occurrences and water chemistry in South China suggests that early animals possibly possessed ability to inhabit anoxic but generally not euxinic environments as free H2S was fatal to most eukaryotes.This view can well explain why those small shell fauna and sponges disappeared from shelf to slope areas where sulfidic Ni-Mo-rich shales were widely deposited.Thus,we conclude that the spatiotemporal variations of ocean chemistry and its biological effects probably played a key role in the phased animal radiations and "extinctions" in the early Cambrian.

Exceptionally preserved brachiopods from the Chengjiang Lagerst(a|¨)tte(Yunnan,China):Perspectives on the Cambrian explosion of metazoans

The Cambrian explosion was coined to describe the geologically sudden appearance of numerous bilaterian body plans(Phyla)around the Ediacaran-Cambrian transition,around 565-520million years ago.Many explanations and conjectures have been postulated in order to explain the pattern and duration of this explosive radiation of many different phyla of early metazoans.Here,we focus on the evolution of a phylum of marine suspension-feeding animals—the brachiopods,as exemplified by the exceptionally preserved taxa from the celebrated Chengjiang Konservat Lagerst(a|¨)tte(Yunnan,China).The abundant soft-bodied preservation at these fossil quarries gives us the only firm insights into what brachiopods looked like and how they functioned and lived when they first appeared on the Earth.Studies of Chengjiang brachiopods demonstrate that the early animals developed a remarkably varied organization of tissues and organs shortly after the onset of Cambrian explosion.In the marine suspension-feeding brachiopods,most importantly the tentaculate feeding structure of early brachiopods is already differentiated into two shapes of lophophore,anteriorly coiled(spiralled)and posteriorly arching tentacle crowns and the unique latter type was previously not documented from fossil and living brachiopods.Also unlike any known Recent brachiopod,all the known Cambrian brachiopods from Chengjiang have an open digestive tract that was disposed either as a Ushaped gut in linguliform and stem group brachiopods,or straight gut with a posterior anus in some calcareous-shelled stocks.Moreover,in contrast toliving lingulids,all the Cambrian brachiopods have an epibenthic lifestyle either cemented by a ventral valve or attached by variable pedicles to establish complex ecological community encompassing primary tierers and variable secondary tierers.It is therefore assumed that brachiopods were the first benthic metazoan that achieved their success in ecological stratification and tiering complexity by late Atdabanian.The setae are also important for the brachiopod suspension-feeding life style,and in the Chengjiang braehiopods they include two types cilia-like and spine-like setae.The mantle canals of different braehiopod species are also distinctly variable in arrangement,mainly disposed in pinnate,baeulate and peripheral conditions.Of these,the peripheral disposition of mantle canals is for the first time proposed here so as to differentiate from the bifurcate condition in recent lingulids in that the former is devoid of posteriorly extending main trunks of sinus,but possesses a diverging dorsal vascula media in dichotomy.

New macroalgal fossils of the Kaili Biota in Guizhou Province, China

The Kaili Biota of Jianhe County, Guizhou Province is found in a Burgess Shale type of deposits, and as such it provides a key fossil record for studying biotic differentiation following the Cambrian explosion. Macroalgae represent several important groups of primary producers and yet have not been well studied. Here, we report two new forms of macroalgae from the Kaili Biota, including a new genus and species and an indeterminate genus and species. The new genus and species, Parallelphyton tipica, is a heterotrichous alga with thalli composed of a prostrate cardinal axis, and parallel bundles of erect trichomes on the axis. The bifurcation of the trichomes is somewhat similar to the living heterotrichous Fritschiella （Chlorophyta）, representing ＂architectonic differentiation＂ only known in higher plants as an adaptation to terrestri~ conditions. The indeterminate genus and species consists of an arched, thick, cylindrical major shaft and irregularly spaced, curved lateral branches attached to the major shaft and subdivided into subbranches. The characteristics of the thick and strong major shaft and the lateral branch subdivided branches are analogous to the dichotomous branching of Psilophyton in Protopteridophyta. Thus, the differentiation of the thalli in these two algal forms represents the expression of properties of some higher metaphytes, indicating that the eco- logical differentiation of the macroalgae was well underway at the time of the Kaili Biota.