EVOMORPH — Theme CHRONOLOGY

How can we use fossils to study temporal variations in taxonomic and phenotypic biodiversity?

• Led by Michel Laurin

This project develops advanced paleontological dating methods to refine the timing of clade appearances and extinctions. By integrating detailed fossil records with fine-scale stratigraphic frameworks, we investigate the dynamics of evolutionary radiations and biological crises. A key objective is also to pinpoint the timing of phenotypic innovations, providing a chronological backbone for the team’s other research themes. These methodologies ultimately improve the temporal resolution of the Tree of Life, allowing for a more precise understanding of evolutionary rates. This project includes developments in biomathematics and computer science through an external collaboration with Gilles Didier (mathematician at IMAG, Montpellier). It is based on our established expertise in phylogenetics based on phenotypic characters (PVC theme), which relies in part on original data, but also by compiling available (but scattered) data in the literature.

Chronogram of Pennsylvanian and Cisuralian eupelycosaurs. The brown lines represent uncertainty about the age of each fossiliferous horizon. The darker areas represent the overlap of possible ages of more than one level. The red curves are probability densities of divergence times.