Shell-crushing predators may have sparked early Cenozoic boom in marine snail evolution
A large-scale study of nearly 700 species reveals the evolutionary relationships and history of Neogastropoda, a diverse group of marine snails. The findings provide new evidence for their single origin, identify four new families and reveal a previously undetected burst of diversification in the early Cenozoic.
A groundbreaking study of nearly 700 marine snail species, known as Neogastropoda, has shed new light on their evolutionary history. The research, led by a team from the Swedish Museum of Natural History and an international group of scientists, has uncovered four new families and revealed a previously unknown diversification burst in the early Cenozoic era.
This discovery challenges previous understanding of the Neogastropoda's emergence, suggesting that changes in the marine predator community may have driven the evolution of more resistant shells in certain lineages. The findings underscore the importance of taxonomy and natural history collections in uncovering hidden biodiversity and provide a solid foundation for future taxonomic research and species descriptions.
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