From Part II of the “Precambrian House of Cards”: Even Evans et al. (2021) themselves admit that “phylogenetic affinities for most of the Ediacara Biota remain enigmatic” and say that “Many Ediacara taxa may represent stem lineages of animal phyla but their diagnostic characters either were not preserved or had not yet evolved.” Hear, hear. Günter Bechly, “Ediacarans Are Not Animals” at Mind Matters News The rest of Gunter Bechly’s series is here. Maybe back then it just wasn’t as clear.

The good news from this mouse study is that if epigenetic stress is recognized, it can be reversed. That means, presumably, that it won’t be passed on: In a study published March 15 in Nature Neuroscience, researchers found that early-life stress in mice induces epigenetic changes in a particular type of neuron, which in turn make the animals more prone to stress later in life. Using a drug that inhibits an enzyme that adds epigenetic marks to histones, they also show that the latent effects of early-life stress can be reversed. “It is a wonderful paper because it is really advancing our ability to understand how events that happen early in life leave enduring signatures in the brain so that Read More ›