|
Young World
Interesting find
FOSSILISED: Ancient marine reptile.
Palaeontologists at the University of Alberta, Canada, recently discovered three new species of an ancient marine reptile. The fossils, which included a pregnant one, had been discovered 25 years ago in the Loon River Formation but had been placed under a ping-pong table in the undergraduate science lab. It took a new faculty member, Michael Caldwell, to rediscover them last month. Examining the ichthyosaur fossils, Caldwell and undergraduate student Erin Maxwell found that not only were the specimens a new species each but also that one was pregnant. Caldwell was quoted on the website LiveScience.com as saying that the pregnant fossil was "probably the most interesting find out of the whole pile" because it ranks as the most geologically recent example of ichthyosaur embryos. The features of the embryos were visible "right down to their little teeny-weeny teeth." These fossils carry the ichthyosaur story forward from the time they fade out of the existing fossil record. Using the ichthyosaur fossils that were found in Germany more than 100 years ago, palaeontologists can now trace the development of the embryos up to the adult stage. The pregnant fossil was named Maiaspondylus lindoei after Allan Lindoe, a member of the original dig who explained the history of the specimens to Caldwell.
COMPLIED BY R. KRITHIKA
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Young World
|
