Phanerozoic marine diversity and the fossil record

@article{Sepkoski1981PhanerozoicMD,
  title={Phanerozoic marine diversity and the fossil record},
  author={J John . Sepkoski and Richard K. Bambach and David M. Raup and James William Valentine},
  journal={Nature},
  year={1981},
  volume={293},
  pages={435-437}
}
Strong correlations between various local and global estimates of Phanerozoic marine diversity for taxa below the ordinal level indicate a single pattern of change underlying all data on fossil density. Geological time alone seems insufficient to explain all of the significant covariation among the data sets, and it is proposed that the common pattern in diversity reflects the signal from a real evolutionary phenomenon strong enough to overcome the biases inherent in the fossil record. 
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371 Citations
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371 Citations

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  • D. Ruban
  • Environmental Science, Geology
  • 2005
The recalculation of the paleontological data of A. dʼORBIGNY on the marine fossils distribution within the Mesozoic stages found that fossils diversity changes constrained with the 150 years old data seem to be enough similar to ones calculated with the recent data.

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Using the fossil records of North America and Western Europe, it is demonstrated that a modelling approach applied to the combined data produces results that are significantly correlated with those derived from subsampling.

Effects of sampling standardization on estimates of Phanerozoic marine diversification

  • J. AlroyC. Marshall A. Webber
  • Environmental Science, Geography
    Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
  • 2001
A new database of this kind for the Phanerozoic fossil record of marine invertebrates is introduced and four substantially distinct analytical methods that estimate taxonomic diversity by quantifying and correcting for variation through time in the number and nature of inventories are applied.

Marine diversity through the Phanerozoic: problems and prospects

  • A. Smith
  • Environmental Science, Geography
    Journal of the Geological Society
  • 2007
The fossil record provides direct evidence of how diversity has changed over time, but cannot be taken at face value. Diversity curves constructed from counting taxa in the rock record are seriously…
...

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