When Darwin wrote On the Origin of Species one of his main concerns was with the perceived shortness of the fossil record of life. Until the work of Schopf and his colleagues much of this history was thought to be unknowable. Life in Deep Time documents astonishing discoveries revealing the first 85% of of the history of life. These earliest periods of life on Earth emerge as a tale of individual exploration told by a scholar whose 60 years of research uncovered the richness and diversity which forms the foundation of todays biodiversity.
1. The Schopf Lineage
2. Schooling and First Year of College
3. Earth's Earliest Life: The Quest Begins
4. The Missing Pre-Cambrian Record of Life
5. Graduate School and Early Career
6. The 1970's: Lucky Time and Time Again
7. The 1980's: The Precambrian Paleobiology Research Group Defines the Field
8. This Science Over the Years
9. Today's Status of This Science
10. Final Comments
J. William Schopf is Distinguished Professor and Director of the Center for the Study of Evolution and the Origin of Life at the University of California Los Angeles. He is an elected member of the American Philosophical Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the National Academy of Sciences. He is the author or co-author of hundreds of scholarly journal articles, as well as many authored and edited books. His books have won 3 national prizes.