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Factsheets

A Classroom Resource About Each Phylum

Factsheets

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    Komodo Sponge
    Factsheet
    Sponges: The Trailblazers

    Scientists believe sponges are the oldest animal phylum. They first appeared about 600 million years ago.

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    Yellow anenome
    Factsheet
    Cnidarians: The Polyp and Medusa

    Scientists think that cnidarians were the first animals to have muscles and nerves to produce behavior.

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    Red orange and pink flatworm
    Factsheet
    Flatworms: An Ancient Body Plan

    Around 20,000 flatworm species today have the same basic body plan that appeared roughly 500 million years ago.

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    Pink and white annelids
    Factsheet
    Annelids: Not Lowly, Lovely

    Annelids are impressively adapted animals that live in every habitable niche on earth except the sky.

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    Kelp Crab
    Factsheet
    Marine Arthropods: An Adaptive Body Plan

    Marine arthropods are the most abundant group of animals in the ocean.

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    Yellow and black spider in web
    Factsheet
    Terrestrial Arthropods: Bold Explorers!

    Arthropods were the first animals to venture out of the sea onto land all over the earth.

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    Spread out octopus
    Factsheet
    Molluscs: Beauty and Diversity

    The diversity of molluscs shows how a fleshy soft body plan can evolve into a variety of forms.

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    Purple echinoderms
    Factsheet
    Echinoderms: The Spiny Rebels

    Modern echinoderms, which include sea stars, urchins, sea cucumbers and sea lilies, have a unique body plan with a five-part symmetry.

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    Blue Tunicates
    Factsheet
    Chordates: This Is Us

    The chordate phylum includes both invertebrates (without backbones) and vertebrates (with backbones).

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    Top of the Tree of Life with Species
    Factsheet
    Cambrian Explosion

    The Cambrian Explosion was a burst of animal evolution that occurred in the ocean about 540 million years ago.

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