据介绍，动物多样化的时间尺度一直是争论的焦点，争论的焦点是如何将进化史与地质时间进行校准。分子钟分析总是估计动物的起源是低温纪或托尼纪，而明确的动物化石首先出现在埃迪卡拉纪。然而，对埃迪卡拉纪关键生物群的重新测定，和几个埃迪卡拉纪冠-后生动物的发现，促使分子钟分析重新校准。
课题组提出了修订的化石校准，并将其用于估计后生动物进化史的时间尺度的分子钟分析。综合系统发育关系、时钟模型和校准策略等不确定性，课题组估计后生动物起源于早埃迪卡拉纪，真后生动物起源于中埃迪卡拉纪，两侧门起源于上埃迪卡拉纪，许多冠门起源于埃迪卡拉纪-寒武纪区间，或者完全起源于寒武纪。这些结果与化石记录更接近，与海洋氧合作用一致，但他们拒绝对化石记录的字面解读。
附：英文原文
Title: Ediacaran origin and Ediacaran-Cambrian diversification of Metazoa
Author: Emily Carlisle, Zongjun Yin, Davide Pisani, Philip C. J. Donoghue
Issue&Volume: 2024-11-15
Abstract: The timescale of animal diversification has been a focus of debate over how evolutionary history should be calibrated to geologic time. Molecular clock analyses have invariably estimated a Cryogenian or Tonian origin of animals while unequivocal animal fossils first occur in the Ediacaran. However, redating of key Ediacaran biotas and the discovery of several Ediacaran crown-Metazoa prompt recalibration of molecular clock analyses. We present revised fossil calibrations and use them in molecular clock analyses estimating the timescale of metazoan evolutionary history. Integrating across uncertainties including phylogenetic relationships, clock model, and calibration strategy, we estimate Metazoa to have originated in the early Ediacaran, Eumetazoa in the middle Ediacaran, and Bilateria in the upper Ediacaran, with many crown-phyla originating across the Ediacaran-Cambrian interval or elsewise fully within the Cambrian. These results are in much closer accord with the fossil record, coinciding with marine oxygenation, but they reject a literal reading of the fossil record.
DOI: adp7161
Source: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adp7161