Ordovician-Silurian extinction: Quick Facts

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Line graph showing the number of marine animal families from the Precambrian era to the present, with illustrations of key groups such as trilobites, ammonoids, marine reptiles, and diatoms. The graph highlights major extinction events and a rise to 1,900 living families today.

Silurian Pentamerus community

Illustration of an early Silurian coral-stromatoporoid community showing various labeled marine organisms, including corals, bryozoans, brachiopods, crinoids, trilobites, and a nautiloid, arranged on and around a block of seafloor substrate with a scale bar indicating centimeters.

brachiopod fossils

Ordovician paleogeography

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Ordovician Period mass extinction event Permian extinction K–T extinction Devonian extinctions end-Triassic extinction Major Mass Extinctions