Davín, Adrián A;
Woodcroft, Ben J;
Soo, Rochelle M;
Morel, Benoit;
Murali, Ranjani;
Schrempf, Dominik;
Clark, James W;
... Szöllősi, Gergely J; + view all
(2025)
A geological timescale for bacterial evolution and oxygen adaptation.
Science
, 388
(6742)
, Article eadp1853. 10.1126/science.adp1853.
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Abstract
Microbial life has dominated Earth’s history but left a sparse fossil record, greatly hindering our understanding of evolution in deep time. However, bacterial metabolism has left signatures in the geochemical record, most conspicuously the Great Oxidation Event (GOE). We combine machine learning and phylogenetic reconciliation to infer ancestral bacterial transitions to aerobic lifestyles, linking them to the GOE to calibrate the bacterial time tree. Extant bacterial phyla trace their diversity to the Archaean and Proterozoic, and bacterial families prior to the Phanerozoic. We infer that most bacterial phyla were ancestrally anaerobic and adopted aerobic lifestyles after the GOE. However, in the cyanobacterial ancestor, aerobic metabolism likely predated the GOE, which may have facilitated the evolution of oxygenic photosynthesis.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | A geological timescale for bacterial evolution and oxygen adaptation |
| Location: | United States |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1126/science.adp1853 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adp1853 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions. |
| Keywords: | Adaptation, Bacteria, Biological Evolution, Cyanobacteria, Machine Learning, Oxidation-Reduction, Oxygen, Photosynthesis, Phylogeny, Physiological |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Life Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Life Sciences > Div of Biosciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Life Sciences > Div of Biosciences > Genetics, Evolution and Environment |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10207500 |
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