Geology

Climate change

Archaeology

Organic chemistry

Biology

Oceanography

Paleontology

Geography

Chemistry

Ecology

Earth science

Sequence (biology)

Tectonics

Environmental science

Phosphorus

Cycling

Genetics

Sedimentary rock

Biogeochemical cycle

Proterozoic

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Significance The evolution of macroscopic animals in the latest Proterozoic Eon is associated with many changes in the geochemical environment, but the sequence of cause and effect remains a topic of intense research and debate. In this study, we use two apparently paradoxical observations—that massively phosphorus-rich rocks first appear at this time, and that the median P content of rocks does not change—to argue for a change in internal marine P cycling associated with rising sulfate levels. We argue that this change was self-sustaining, setting in motion a cascade of biogeochemical transformations that led to conditions favorable for major ecological and evolutionary change.

Ediacaran reorganization of the marine phosphorus cycle