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.
374 Citations
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- Environmental ScienceProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
- 2002
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- Environmental Science, GeologyProceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
- 2012
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- Environmental Science, GeographyJournal 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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- Environmental Science, GeographyProceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
- 2009
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- Environmental Science, GeographyPaleobiology
- 1988
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- Environmental Science, GeographyScience
- 2011
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