New research from the University of St Andrews has discovered a crucial piece in the puzzle of how all animals with a spine—including all mammals, fish, reptiles and amphibians—evolved. In a paper ...

Scientists have long puzzled over the gap in the fossil record that would explain the evolution of invertebrates to vertebrates. Vertebrates, including fishes, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals, ...

Charles Darwin proposed that evolution is driven by gradual variations in organisms that have a survival advantage in a changing environment. But University of Maryland evolutionary biologist Karen ...