Many major groups of animals that have become a mainstay in modern times first appeared during the Cambrian Explosion.

Evolutionary Update Cambrian sediments found in Canada, Greenland, and China have yielded rarely fossilized soft-bodied creatures such as marine worms buried during undersea mud avalanches.

Even paleontologists sometimes wonder: Why do Cambrian creatures look so strange? Animals from this ancient time are certainly distinctive.

Cambrian Period creatures known as sea moths seemed alien because of their additional eye, but a study finds anatomical features more in line with modern animals.

The first signs of complex animal life begin in the Ediacaran Period, which started more than 600 million years ago. But it's difficult to understand how those organisms relate to the life we see ...

Fossils offer a glimpse into Earth's ancient life, revealing the origins and evolution of complex organisms. Discoveries like ...

A major fossil site bearing witness to the Cambrian explosion and providing evolutionary evidence for early life-forms, it was deemed one of the most surprising scientific discoveries of the 20th ...

But during the Cambrian period, creatures with complex body structures emerged. Scientists who study such things call this the "Cambrian explosion" because it was a period of rapid evolution.

Cambrian sediments found in Canada, Greenland, and China have yielded rarely fossilized soft-bodied creatures such as marine worms buried during undersea mud avalanches.