Origin of metazoans and the Cambrian explosion: preface

The origin of animals and the Cambrian explosion are two significant biological events of evolutionary innovation during the life history. To highlight the recent progresses and provide new perspectives in this research field, we organized this the-matic issue entitled “origin of metazoans and the Cambrian explosion”. As the preface of this special issue, we herein re-viewed the significances and the development trends of this field, and then briefly summarized the progresses illustrated by this issue. The special issue collected 12 papers contributed by 42 authors from 13 universities and institutes, including 1 re-view paper and 11 research articles. These studies focused on several fossil Lagerst?tten from South and North China, such as the Ediacaran Shibantan biota, the Cambrian Kuanchuanpu and Kaili biotas, covering advances in a number of fossil ani-mal groups including sponges, cnidarians, brachiopods, trilobites and bivalved arthropods, as well as some problematic ani-mal fossils.

Project Supported:

Clc Number: