Nature
Volume 528 Number 7582 pp307-430 17 December 2015
http://www.nature.com/nature/current_issue.html

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Review
Rarity in mass extinctions and the future of ecosystems
Pincelli M. Hull, Simon A. F. Darroch & Douglas H. Erwin
The fossil record provides a nuanced view of ecosystem collapse over intervals of mass extinction, with abundant, biomineralizing and widespread species preferentially preserved; here the authors collate evidence for ‘mass rarity’ during these intervals, and suggest that the increasing rarity of modern species, rather than their outright extinction, may be a better metric for comparing the current biodiversity crisis to the ‘Big Five’ mass extinctions in the Earth’s history.