Evening talk by Yale University's Professor Derek Briggs on the discovery of soft-bodied fossils at sites such as the Burgess Shale in Canada and Chengjiang in China, which reveal a remarkable range of animals that evolved more than 500 million years ago. Sites of exceptional preservation such as these, which are the source of animals such as Anomalocaris and Hallucigenia, provide key evidence of diversity in the Cambrian seas. This talk will explore how research on these fossils has contributed to our understanding of the early evolution of marine animals.

Professor Derek Briggs is the G. Evelyn Hutchinson Professor of Geology & Geophysics at Yale University and a Curator at the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History. His primary research interest is in the preservation and evolutionary significance of exceptionally preserved fossil biotas.

Free, but advance booking required.

This event is now fully booked - if you would like to attend but have not yet booked a ticket please email exhibitions@oum.ox.ac.uk to check if any tickets have become available.

Suitable for adults and young people – beginners and experts welcome!

Speakers will start with the basics before introducing their specialist field of expertise.

5.30pm doors open for viewing of the First Animals exhibition

6.00pm talk begins in the Lecture Theatre