A Treasure Trove of Cambrian Fossils Rewrites the Story of Early Life
One of the oldest fossilized hemichordates, Sphenoecium are tubular marine invertebrates closely related to sea stars and sea urchins.
海绵动物是最古老的半索动物化石之一，是管状海洋无脊椎动物，与海星和海胆密切相关。
The long protrusions look plant-like but are actually a colony of small worm-shaped animals housed in branching organic tubes.
长长的突起看起来像植物，但实际上是一群小蠕虫状动物，栖息在分支有机管中。
Han Zeng/Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
韩曾/中国科学院南京地质古生物研究所
R oughly 540 million years ago, toward the start of the Cambrian Period, the planet was mostly ocean, and life was both alien and vaguely familiar.
大约 5.4 亿年前，寒武纪初期，地球上大部分都是海洋，生命既陌生又有些熟悉。
Small, phallic-looking worms rummaged through ocean-floor sediments while blind swimming beasts flung out whiplike tentacles to ensnare prey.
看起来像阳具的小蠕虫在海底沉积物中翻找，而盲目的游动野兽则抛出鞭子般的触手来诱捕猎物。
Meanwhile, early versions of mollusks and sponges populated the seafloor as jellyfish floated above.
与此同时，早期的软体动物和海绵在海底繁殖，而水母则漂浮在上面。
Shallow ocean waters and an increase in oxygen levels in Earth’s atmosphere triggered what we call the Cambrian explosion: the first major blossoming of modern biodiversity.
浅海海水和地球大气中氧气含量的增加引发了我们所说的寒武纪大爆发：现代生物多样性的第一次大规模繁荣。
Life forms of increasing complexity filled the seas, providing the evolutionary foundations for nearly every phylum alive today.
海洋中的生命形式日益复杂，为当今几乎所有门类提供了进化基础。
Then, around 513.5 million years ago, came the Sinsk event, the first known mass extinction of the Phanerozoic, our current geologic eon.
然后，大约 5.135 亿年前，发生了辛斯克事件，这是显生宙（我们当前的地质纪元）中第一次已知的大规模灭绝。
As Earth’s tectonic plates shifted, huge volumes of volcanic gas and carbon dioxide transformed the atmosphere, sucking oxygen out of the oceans and devastating shallow-water environments.
随着地球构造板块的移动，大量的火山气体和二氧化碳改变了大气，从海洋中吸走氧气，破坏了浅水环境。
Much of what scientists know about this period in Earth’s history comes from Charles Doolittle Walcott’s discovery of the Burgess Shale in British Columbia in 1909.
科学家对地球历史这一时期的了解大部分来自查尔斯·杜立特·沃尔科特 (Charles Doolittle Walcott) 1909 年在不列颠哥伦比亚省发现的伯吉斯页岩。
The Burgess Shale is one of a small handful of Cambrian deposits that reach the level of Lagerstätten , a German term used to describe incredibly diverse and exceptionally preserved fossil sites.
伯吉斯页岩是少数达到 Lagerstätten 水平的寒武纪沉积物之一，Lagerstätten 是一个德语术语，用于描述极其多样化且保存完好的化石遗址。
Sites that preserve soft-bodied organisms are even rarer because soft tissues decompose more easily, making these places especially useful for piecing together prehistoric ecosystems.
保存软体生物的地点更加罕见，因为软组织更容易分解，这使得这些地方对于拼凑史前生态系统特别有用。
Fossils from these most special locations not only show body outlines and external textures but also preserve details from appendages and internal organs, from eyes and gills to guts and nerve networks.
来自这些最特殊地点的化石不仅显示了身体轮廓和外部纹理，还保留了附肢和内脏器官、从眼睛和鳃到内脏和神经网络的细节。
Other notable Lagerstätten include the Chengjiang Fossil Site (China), Sirius Passet (Greenland), and Emu Bay Shale (Australia).
其他著名的化石遗址包括澄江化石遗址（中国）、天狼星帕塞特（格陵兰）和鸸鹋湾页岩（澳大利亚）。
In 2026, a new Cambrian Lagerstätte entered the scene.
2026 年，全新 Cambrian Lagerstätte 登场。
Paleontologists in southern China uncovered a trove of some of the best-preserved Cambrian fossils to date — a massive collection of 8,681 fossils spanning 153 species — named the Huayuan biota.
中国南方的古生物学家发现了迄今为止保存最完好的寒武纪化石宝库——涵盖 153 个物种的 8,681 块化石——被命名为“花园生物群”。
Many of the Huayuan fossils look similar, if not identical, to those in the Burgess Shale, indicating that these marine ecosystems were connected by global ocean currents.
许多花园化石看起来与伯吉斯页岩中的化石相似，甚至完全相同，这表明这些海洋生态系统通过全球洋流连接在一起。
Crucially, because the Huayuan site postdates the Sinsk event and represents deeper parts of the ocean, the collection indicates that deep-water environments were a refuge for organisms during mass extinction.
至关重要的是，由于花园遗址发生在辛斯克事件之后，并且代表了海洋的更深部分，因此这些藏品表明深水环境是大规模灭绝期间生物体的避难所。
Most of the modern world’s major groups, or clades, of organisms began to emerge after the Sinsk event — the first mass extinction of the Phanerozoic Eon.
现代世界的大多数主要生物类群或进化枝在辛斯克事件（显生宙的第一次大规模灭绝）之后开始出现。
Some of the biggest clades that emerged and that were found in the Huayuan biota include arthropods (ancestors to insects and crustaceans), poriferans (sponges), cnidarians (jellyfish, corals, sea anemones), priapulids (marine worms), brachiopods (filter-feeders similar to bivalves), and lobopodians (limbed, worm-like creatures).
在花园生物群中发现的一些最大的进化枝包括节肢动物（昆虫和甲壳类动物的祖先）、多孔动物（海绵）、刺胞动物（水母、珊瑚、海葵）、节肢动物（海洋蠕虫）、腕足动物（类似于双壳类的滤食动物）和叶足动物（有肢的蠕虫状生物）。
To paleontologists’ delight, more than half of the species uncovered at the Huayuan site are new to science.
令古生物学家高兴的是，在花园遗址发现的物种中有一半以上都是科学上的新物种。
“As we discovered more and more animal species in the field and in our lab, we were surprised by the extraordinary diversity of this soft-bodied biota,” said study author Han Zeng , head of the Chengjiang Paleontological Station and a paleontologist at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
“随着我们在野外和实验室发现越来越多的动物物种，我们对这种软体生物群的非凡多样性感到惊讶，”该研究的作者、澄江古生物站站长、中国科学院古生物学家韩增说。
Zeng says that what’s been uncovered in the new deposit is only a fraction of the tens of thousands of other fossils there.
曾说，在新矿床中发现的只是那里数以万计的其他化石的一小部分。
They reveal a clearer picture of what life looked like in the early Cambrian’s deep marine environment after the Sinsk extinction.
它们更清晰地揭示了辛斯克灭绝后寒武纪早期深海环境中生命的样子。
Because this collection is so biodiverse and represents a part of the world that paleobiologists have understood little about — the deep seas — it can help them refine hypotheses about how all modern animal phyla on Earth evolved.
因为这个集合具有如此丰富的生物多样性，并且代表了古生物学家对世界知之甚少的部分——深海——它可以帮助他们完善关于地球上所有现代动物门如何进化的假设。
These new fossils are yielding clues about the origins of oceanic carbon cycling, how ocean currents connected food webs on opposite sides of the globe, and the forces that drove ecosystems to become as complex as they are today.
这些新化石提供了有关海洋碳循环起源、洋流如何连接地球两侧食物网以及推动生态系统变得如此复杂的力量的线索。
“These are just exquisite fossils,” said Doug Erwin , a paleontologist and evolutionary biologist at the Santa Fe Institute who was not involved in the discovery but collaborates with Zeng.
“这些都是精美的化石，”圣达菲研究所的古生物学家和进化生物学家道格·欧文（Doug Erwin）说，他没有参与这一发现，但与曾合作。
“They’re really beautiful specimens.”
“它们真的是美丽的标本。”
All images courtesy of Han Zeng/Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, Chinese Academy of Sciences.
所有图片均由 Han Zeng/中国科学院南京地质古生物研究所提供。
PELAGIC TUNICATES are gelatinous, free-floating marine invertebrates that are central to the ocean’s biological carbon pump: Phytoplankton remove dissolved carbon dioxide, and then tunicates eat the phytoplankton and release carbon-dense waste pellets that sink to the seafloor for long-term storage.
中上层被囊动物是凝胶状、自由漂浮的海洋无脊椎动物，是海洋生物碳泵的核心：浮游植物去除溶解的二氧化碳，然后被囊动物吃掉浮游植物并释放碳密集的废物颗粒，这些废物颗粒沉入海底长期储存。
These fossilized pelagic tunicates suggest that this carbon pump originated in the Cambrian, said Han Zeng.
韩曾说，这些远洋被囊类动物化石表明，这种碳泵起源于寒武纪。
In 2010, paleontologist Jean-Bernard Caron and colleagues found a rare, tentacled, Cambrian-era animal from the Burgess Shale called HERPETOGASTER COLLINSI .
2010 年，古生物学家 Jean-Bernard Caron 及其同事在伯吉斯页岩中发现了一种罕见的寒武纪时代的有触角动物，名为 HERPETOGASTER COLLINSI。
This fossil from the new Huayuan biota is the same species.
这块化石来自新花园生物群，是同一物种。
“It’s nice to see it on another continent,” said Caron, who is at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.
“很高兴在另一个大陆看到它，”在多伦多皇家安大略博物馆工作的卡伦说。
RADIODONTS , extinct arthropods, were like “the Tyrannosaurus rex of the Cambrian,” said Doug Erwin.
放射齿兽，一种已灭绝的节肢动物，就像“寒武纪的霸王龙”，道格·欧文说。
Typically around 1 meter long, the radiodont dominated these ecosystems as their largest predator.
放射齿兽通常长约 1 米，是这些生态系统中最大的捕食者。
However, this new fossil — complete with preserved eyes and gills on each side of its body — is smaller than 5 centimeters.
然而，这块新化石的身体两侧都保存有眼睛和鳃，尺寸还不到 5 厘米。
MEGACHEIRANS were predatory arthropods with a unique survival strategy.
MEGACHEIRANS 是掠食性节肢动物，具有独特的生存策略。
Lacking vision, they ambushed prey by flinging out whiplike frontal tails to entangle their targets.
由于缺乏视力，它们伏击猎物时会抛出鞭状的前尾来缠住目标。
Such specialized predators are characteristic of the Cambrian.
这种专门的掠食者是寒武纪的特征。
“It’s another indication of the ecological breadth that was already present in these very early ecosystems,” Erwin said.
欧文说：“这是这些非常早期的生态系统中已经存在的生态广度的另一个迹象。”
This fossil displays its ventral nerve cord.
这块化石展示了它的腹神经索。
LOBOPODIANS used their long legs to walk along the seafloor.
罗波波迪亚人用他们的长腿在海底行走。
When paleontologists first discovered these fossils in the Burgess Shale, “they didn’t know quite what to do,” Erwin said.
当古生物学家第一次在伯吉斯页岩中发现这些化石时，“他们不知道该怎么办，”欧文说。
We now think lobopods were ancestors of modern arthropods, tardigrades, and velvet worms.
我们现在认为叶足类动物是现代节肢动物、缓步动物和绒虫的祖先。
“Having these kinds of fossils is incredibly useful” for understanding evolutionary trajectories, he added.
他补充说，“拥有此类化石对于理解进化轨迹非常有用”。
GUANSHANCARIS KUNMINGENSIS is the largest fossil identified in the Huayuan biota so far.
昆明关山卡里斯是迄今为止在花园生物群中发现的最大的化石。
It was also found in the nearby Guanshan biota, another deposit in southern China, in 2023.
2023年，在中国南方的另一个矿床附近的关山生物群中也发现了它。
This arthropod, around three-quarters of a meter in length, would have been an apex predator in the Cambrian oceans.
这种节肢动物长约四分之三米，可能是寒武纪海洋的顶级掠食者。
MARRELLA was one of the first three species Walcott found at the Burgess Shale in 1909.
MARRELLA 是沃尔科特 1909 年在伯吉斯页岩中最早发现的三个物种之一。
“Walcott was quite enamored of Marrella ,” Erwin said.
“沃尔科特非常迷恋马雷拉，”埃尔文说。
“He called it ‘the lace crab.’” This spiny-backed arthropod is the most abundant fossil in the Burgess Shale and was also uncovered in the Huayuan biota.
“他称之为‘花边蟹’。”这种刺背节肢动物是伯吉斯页岩中最丰富的化石，也在花园生物群中发现。
Here, the fossil reveals its intestines.
在这里，化石露出了它的肠道。
In the Cambrian Period, predatory worms called PRIAPULIDS were abundant, while annelids, modern-day segmented worms, were scarce.
在寒武纪，被称为 PRIAPULIDS 的捕食性蠕虫大量存在，而环节动物（现代分节蠕虫）却很稀少。
Now it’s the opposite.
现在情况恰恰相反。
“There was obviously a shift in the nature of these [ocean floor] habitats at some point,” Erwin said, but “we don’t know when that happened.” Finding fossils like this from the Permian Period (299 to 251 million years ago) would help piece together that history, he added.
埃尔文说：“这些[海底]栖息地的性质显然在某个时刻发生了变化，但我们不知道这种情况何时发生。”他补充说，找到二叠纪时期（距今 299 至 2.51 亿年前）的此类化石将有助于拼凑这段历史。
This cactuslike animal called ALLONNIA was a type of chancelloriid, an animal resembling a sponge that was anchored to substrate, rocks, or sponges and only lived during the Cambrian Period, Zeng said.
曾说，这种名为“ALLONNIA”的类似仙人掌的动物是一种类似海绵的动物，固定在基质、岩石或海绵上，只生活在寒武纪时期。
REDLICHIA (PTEROREDLICHIA) CHINENSIS is the largest trilobite from the Huayuan biota and has also been found in other Cambrian deposits across south China, Zeng said.
曾说，REDLICHIA (PTEROREDLICHIA) CHINENSIS 是花园生物群中最大的三叶虫，在中国南方的其他寒武纪沉积物中也发现了这种情况。
As a hard-bodied animal, trilobites have been preserved much better in the fossil record and are therefore better studied.
作为一种身体坚硬的动物，三叶虫在化石记录中保存得更好，因此得到了更好的研究。
Left : This cactuslike ALLONNIA was a type of chancelloriid, an animal resembling a sponge that was anchored to substrate, rocks, or sponges and only lived during the Cambrian Period, Zeng said.
左图：这种类似仙人掌的 ALLONNIA 是一种类似海绵的动物，固定在基质、岩石或海绵上，只生活在寒武纪，曾说。
Right : REDLICHIA (PTEROREDLICHIA) CHINENSIS is the largest trilobite from the Huayuan biota and has also been found in other Cambrian deposits across south China, Zeng said.
右：REDLICHIA (PTEROREDLICHIA) CHINENSIS 是花园生物群中最大的三叶虫，在中国南方的其他寒武纪沉积物中也有发现，曾说。
As a hard-bodied animal, trilobites have been preserved much better in the fossil record and are therefore better studied.
作为一种身体坚硬的动物，三叶虫在化石记录中保存得更好，因此得到了更好的研究。
This ARTIOPOD is another extinct type of arthropod.
这种节肢动物是另一种已灭绝的节肢动物。
A feathery semicircle shows the intricacies of its gut.
羽毛般的半圆形显示了其复杂的肠道。
“Those are where all the gastric enzymes are secreted in the gut that flow down and help digest what it just ate,” Erwin explained.
“这些是肠道中分泌所有胃酶的地方，这些酶向下流动并帮助消化刚刚吃的东西，”埃尔文解释说。
Details like this “beautifully illustrate the quality of preservation” in the new Huayuan collection, he added.
他补充说，像这样的细节“完美地说明了新华源系列的保存质量”。
BRACHIOPODS first appeared in the fossil record during the Cambrian and were widespread until the Permian-Triassic mass extinction.
腕足动物在寒武纪首次出现在化石记录中，并广泛分布到二叠纪-三叠纪大规模灭绝。
This Huayuan species called ASKEPASMA TRANSVERSALIS has a pair of shells at the end of a long stalk that was attached to the seafloor.
这种名为 ASKEPASMA TRANSVERSALIS 的花源物种在附着在海底的长柄末端有一对贝壳。
These visual doppelgängers of bivalves still exist in the modern world but are now relatively scarce.
这些视觉上的双壳类动物在现代世界中仍然存在，但现在相对稀少。
This fossil looks like a sea urchin, but it’s actually a sponge known as CHOIA CARTERI that has also been found in North American Cambrian fossil sites.
这块化石看起来像海胆，但实际上是一种名为 CHOIA CARTERI 的海绵，在北美寒武纪化石遗址中也发现过。
The long spicules probably acted as a snowshoe for the muddy ocean floor, Erwin said.
埃尔文说，长长的针状体可能充当了泥泞海底的雪鞋。
This sponge, likely from the genus CRUMILLOSPONGIA , is “beautifully preserved,” Erwin said.
埃尔文说，这种海绵很可能来自 CRUMILLOSPONGIA 属，“保存得很好”。
It has also been found in the Burgess Shale.
在伯吉斯页岩中也发现了它。
Left : BRACHIOPODS first appeared in the fossil record during the Cambrian and were widespread until the Permian-Triassic mass extinction.
左：腕足动物在寒武纪首次出现在化石记录中，直到二叠纪-三叠纪大规模灭绝为止广泛分布。
This Huayuan species called ASKEPASMA TRANSVERSALIS has a pair of shells at the end of a long stalk that was attached to the seafloor.
这种名为 ASKEPASMA TRANSVERSALIS 的花源物种在附着在海底的长柄末端有一对贝壳。
These visual doppelgängers of bivalves still exist in the modern world but are now relatively scarce.
这些视觉上的双壳类动物在现代世界中仍然存在，但现在相对稀少。
Center : This fossil looks like a sea urchin, but it’s actually a sponge known as CHOIA CARTERI that has also been found in North American Cambrian fossil sites.
中：这块化石看起来像海胆，但实际上是一种名为 CHOIA CARTERI 的海绵，在北美寒武纪化石遗址中也发现过。
The long spicules probably acted as a snowshoe for the muddy ocean floor, Erwin said.
埃尔文说，长长的针状体可能充当了泥泞海底的雪鞋。
Right : This sponge, likely from the genus CRUMILLOSPONGIA , is “beautifully preserved,” Erwin said.
右图：这种海绵可能来自 CRUMILLOSPONGIA 属，“保存完好”，欧文说。
It has also been found in the Burgess Shale.
在伯吉斯页岩中也发现了它。
This shrimplike creature is a new type of waptiid of the extinct arthropod order HYMENOCARINA .
这种像虾一样的生物是已灭绝的节肢动物目 HYMENOCARINA 的一种新型瓦普蒂科动物。
A symmetrical outer shell protected its upper body, while the tail was exposed.
对称的外壳保护着它的上半身，而尾巴却暴露在外。
This fossil shows tiny details that are rarely preserved, including its guts and small frontal appendages.
这块化石展示了很少被保存下来的微小细节，包括它的内脏和小的额附肢。
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