Disentangling the interplay between life and environment across the Ediacaran-Cambrian transition
Schedule
Wed, 18 Feb, 2026 at 01:00 pm
UTC+00:00Location
University of Leicester | Leicester, EN
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School of Geography, Geology and the Environment Research Seminar Series"Disentangling the interplay between life and environment across the Ediacaran-Cambrian transition"
Professor Alex Liu
Professor of Palaeobiology, University of Cambridge
Wednesday 18 February 2026, 1.00pm-2.00pm
Attenborough Seminar Block, Room 208
The early evolutionary history of animals, and specifically the establishment of the bodyplans of the major animal phyla, played out over a protracted interval spanning the late Ediacaran (~574-539 Mya) to early Cambrian (539-510 Mya) periods. In addition to a clear first-order trend of increasing diversity and disparity across this interval, analyses of global palaeontological data have been argued to support multiple pulses of evolutionary radiation and extinction.
In this talk Professor Alex Liu will present recent work by his group to determine the extent to which environmental parameters have shaped our perception of Ediacaran-Cambrian evolutionary events. Consideration of palaeogeographic and facies-scale sedimentological data permits recognition of sampling biases, taphonomic variability, and palaeoecological inequality between fossil localities at local and regional scales. Decoupling such environmental parameters from original evolutionary signals challenges both the paradigm of coherent late Ediacaran biotic assemblages, and claims of major mass extinction or biotic replacement events prior to the Ediacaran-Cambrian boundary.
Professor Alex Liu is a palaeobiologist whose research focuses on the fossil record of the earliest animals. His research includes investigation of: the late Ediacaran fossil record (spanning the geological interval ~580 to 539 million years ago when the earliest recognisable animals diversified throughout the global oceans); the sedimentary record of glacial conditions through time; Ediacaran-Cambrian palaeogeography; and the preservation of soft tissues in the rock record. He combines biological, ecological, sedimentological and analytical approaches to resolve the early evolutionary history of animals, and the interplay between biological evolution and major environmental change.
More information: https://le.ac.uk/gge/events/research-seminars
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