The Cambrian Period: The History and Legacy of the Start of Complex Life on Earth

As Earth entered the Cambrian Period, there was a relatively sudden increase in life form diversity throughout the oceans. Completely new forms of life, more complex and more diverse than anything that had been seen before, began to spread. This acceleration in the evolution of new forms of life was so dramatic that this has come to be known as the “Cambrian explosion.”

Although new species in the Cambrian explosion developed almost entirely in the oceans, the land was not entirely devoid...