Data were collected by Jonathan Payne and Sarah Truebe. Questions should be directed to Jonathan Payne (jlpayne@stanford.edu). payne_occurrences.txt - tab delimited text file containing list of species occurrences payne_collections.txt – tab delimited text file containing summary data for each collection payne_collections_genus.txt - tab delimited text file containing list of genera and number of specimens per genus for each collection payne_global_genus.txt tab delimited text file containing list of genera for each stage and the number of genus occurrences for each genus in each stage payne_occurrences.txt data fields: Tectonic_plate_ID – tectonic plate of occurrence, from Scotese PointTracker software Collection_number – unique identifier for the collection associated with the occurrence No_of_specimens – number of specimens reported for the species in this collection Genus – genus name Species – species name Stage – stage to which collection was assigned payne_collections.txt data fields: Collection_number – unique identifier for the collection associated with the occurrence Full_citation – full bibliographic citation to primary source Locality_name – the name associated with the collection latitude_decimal – latitude of collection in decimal degrees longitude_decimal – longitude of collection in decimal degrees payne_collections_genus.txt data fields: Collection_number – unique identifier for the collection associated with the occurrence Genus – genus name Log10(no_of_specimens) – base 10 logarithm of the total number of specimens reported for the genus in the specified collection Geographic_Range – number of unique tectonic plates on which the genus occurred in the stage Extinction_status – variable coding whether or not genus went extinct at the end of the stage, 0 indicates survival into subsequent stage, 1 indicates extinction Stage – stage to which collection was assigned payne_global_genus.txt data fields: Genus – genus name Genus_occurrences – number of collections in which the genus occurred during the stage Geographic_Range(plates) - number of unique tectonic plates on which the genus occurred in the stage Geographic_Range(max_great_circle) – maximum great circle distance between occurrences of the genus in the stage, in thousands of km Extinction_status – variable coding whether or not genus went extinct at the end of the stage, 0 indicates survival into subsequent stage, 1 indicates extinction