The Many Origins

The picture

The bush.

A view of the actual shape. The centre is LUCA — the last universal common ancestor of every cell on Earth. Three deep branches radiate outward into the three domains of life. Each dot on the branches is one independent origin of multicellularity. The distance from the centre is geological time: branches near the centre are older, the outer rim is the present. Click any dot for mechanism, dates, and primary literature.

Clonal — cells stayed attached after dividing
Aggregative — separate cells come together
Mixed / not multicellular in the strict sense
Complex  ·  Simple-to-complex  ·  Simple
Opisthokonta Amoebozoa Excavata (Discoba) Archaeplastida SAR Cyanobacteria Streptomyces Myxobacteria Biofilm-forming bacteria Actinoarchaeum lineage Compression-induced haloarchaeon Animals Dikarya Fonticula Dictyostelia Copromyxa Acrasid slime moulds Red algae Land plants Volvocaceae Brown algae Sorodiplophrys Sorogena Guttulinopsis BACTERIA ARCHAEA EUKARYOTES

The bush is drawn with three deep arcs from LUCA — Bacteria, Archaea, Eukaryotes — for clarity. Strictly, eukaryotes are nested inside Archaea (sister to or within the Asgard archaea); see Chapter 1, Part 1. Branch lengths are not to molecular-clock scale; only the radial position of each origin dot and date band is. Each terminal branch's date range is the published uncertainty for that origin event. Counts and dates trace back to content/01-polyphyly/independent-origins.md.

→ Same origins, plotted on a linear time axis  ·  Read Chapter 1  ·  Bibliography