(Inside Science) — A new trove of outstandingly preserved fossils in China from the dawn of animal life rivals the horde of weird creatures found in legendary sites such as the Burgess Shale, and may shed light on many puzzles concerning the animal family tree, a new study finds.

The earliest hints of life in the roughly 4.5 billion-year history of Earth may have appeared 3.95 billion years ago, but for a long time after that, life consisted of relatively simple organisms. However, about