The Cenozoic era, meaning “new life”, is a division of earth’s history spanning from around 66 million years ago to the present. It is subdivided into the Paleogene, Neogene and Quaternary periods. The beginning of the Cenozoic is characterised by a phase of recovery following the end Cretaceous mass extinction, and during which mammals and birds began to diversify.
Published on March 1st, 2015 | by David Marshall
Insects are the most abundant and diverse group on animals on the planet today. Would they therefore also be expected to have the richest fossil record? When did they first evolve and how rapid was their [&hellip... Read More →
Published on February 1st, 2015 | by David Marshall
Brachiopods are some of the most common fossils to be found in rocks worldwide. Their thick, hard and (often) calcareous shells make them preferentially preserved in the fossil record. We probably all have found one, but [&hellip... Read More →
Published on October 16th, 2014 | by David Marshall
Ostracods are tiny crustaceans (relatives of shrimps, crabs and water-fleas), distinguished by having a shell that is easily fossilised. As microfossils, by virtue of a long and rich fossil record, ostracods are extremely useful for determining [&hellip... Read More →
Published on September 15th, 2014 | by Laura Soul
Planktonic foraminifera are single celled organisms that are highly abundant in modern oceans and a hugely important part of the Earth’s carbon cycle. Each cell builds a hard calcite ‘test’ around itself in a huge variety [&hellip... Read More →
Published on August 5th, 2014 | by David Marshall
We’re all familiar with canines (dogs, wolves, jackals, foxes, etc), but these are just only one of three sub-families of the larger canid family to survive to the present day. There were also the Hesperocyoninae and [&hellip... Read More →
Published on March 15th, 2014 | by David Marshall
One of the most iconic animals to ever have gone extinct is the dodo, Raphus cucullatus. Endemic to Mauritius, this flightless bird was last seen around 1662 and is thought to have been driven to extinction by [&hellip... Read More →
Published on February 1st, 2014 | by Joe Keating
Mammals are an incredibly diverse and highly successful group of animals. They include some of the tallest, heaviest and fastest animals around today, as well as our own species. For over 100 years, biologists have attempted [&hellip... Read More →
Published on January 16th, 2014 | by Laura Soul
Continuing our look at Australia’s marsupials, we speak to Dr. Karen Black, also of the University of New South Wales. We discuss the Riversleigh fossil site, which fossils it contains, how they are preserved and what [&hellip... Read More →
Published on January 1st, 2014 | by Laura Soul
Marsupials are a group of mammals best known from Australia, but are also present in South America and up to the southern and eastern parts of the USA. Despite their current geographical distribution, metatherians (the group [&hellip... Read More →
Published on December 1st, 2013 | by David Marshall
What are Mass extinctions, how are they quantified, what are the driving forces behind them, how bad were the ones in the past and will we have more in the future? To answer these questions we [&hellip... Read More →
Palaeocast team vacancies
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Episode 154/155: The Byron Dig
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Episode 153: Castle Bank
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Episode 151/152: Lissamphibian Origins
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