The Ediacaran origin of Ecdysozoa: integrating fossil and phylogenomic data

Ecdysozoans (Phyla Arthropoda, Kinorhyncha, Loricifera, Nematoda, Nematomorpha, Onychophora, Priapulida, Tardigrada) are invertebrates bearing a tough, periodically moulted cuticle that predisposes them to exceptional preservation. Ecdysozoans dominate the oldest exceptionally preserved bilaterian animal biotas in the early to mid-Cambrian (c. 520–508 Ma), with possible trace fossils in the latest Ediacaran (
The NERC GW4 + Doctoral Training Partnership provided stipend and research expenditure to R.J.H. D.P. and M.G. were supported by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement 764840. D.P. and P.C.J.D. were funded by Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) grant NE/P013678/1, part of the Biosphere Evolution, Transitions and Resilience (BETR) programme, which is co-funded by the Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC). P.C.J.D. is funded by Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) grants BB/N000919/1 and BB/T012773/1. R.M.K. was funded by the Danish Natural Science Research Council (grant FNU 272-08-0576) and Carlsberg Foundation (grants CF 970345/30-488, CF 2009_01_0063, CF 2012_01_0123 and CF 16-0236). J.O. was supported by a grant from the Danish Agency for Science, Technology and Innovation (0601-12345B). M.A.W acknowledges BBSRC grant BB/K006754/1 and JTF Grant 61408. NERC Independent Research Fellowship (Grant 680 NE/L011751/1) provided salary and research expenditure for X.-Y.M. J.F.F was funded by Royal Society–Japan Society for the Promotion of Science KAKENHI grant 18F18788.