Ecology Lecture 10

Vertebrate origin and diversification and vertebrate classification

Vertebrates are a sub-phylum of the Chordata and are characterised by the presence of a backbone.

Vertebrates in the tree of life

• They are just a small fraction of the animal kingdom

• About 45,000 living species on 8.7 million animals 

Vertebrates closest relatives

They are grouped together with subphyla Tunicata and Cephalocordata within the phylum Chordata.

They are all Deuterostome (= superphylum of bilateral animals defined by early embryological development of the a cavity rather than the mouth).

Fossil evidences

The first Chordata appear in the earliest…