Phanerozoic marine diversity and the fossil record
NaturePublished 1 October 1981
J. John Sepkoski, Richard K. Bambach, David M. Raup, James W. Valentine
Citations454
SJR quartileQ1
SJR score18.29
SNIP10.16
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Abstract
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.
Keywords
Earth and Planetary Sciences
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