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Ecological neutral theory reveals the effect of biases in the fossil record

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Using a mechanistic model based on neutral theory, we examined the effects of the ‘Carboniferous rainforest collapse’ on early tetrapod diversity. Our findings highlight the power of mechanistic models for decoding the fossil record and underscore the criticality of adjusting for sampling biases.

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Fig. 1: Simulated scenarios and model overview.

References

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This is a summary of: Dunne, E. M. et al. Mechanistic neutral models show that sampling biases drive the apparent explosion of early tetrapod diversity. Nat. Ecol. Evol. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-023-02128-3 (2023)

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Ecological neutral theory reveals the effect of biases in the fossil record. Nat Ecol Evol 7, 1360–1361 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-023-02138-1

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