Scientists at the University of Missouri have actually discovered an uncommon, 500-million-year-old “worm-like” fossil called a palaeoscolecid, which is an uncommon fossil group in North America. Credit: University of Missouri
Researchers at the University of Missouri are utilizing an ancient discover to open new ideas surrounding the variety of types following the Cambrian explosion.
Many researchers consider the “Cambrian explosion”– which took place about 530-540 million years ago– as the first significant appearance of a number of the worlds animal groups in the fossil record. Like including pieces to a huge jigsaw puzzle, each discovery dating from this time period has added another piece to the evolutionary map of contemporary animals. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri have found a rare, 500-million-year-old “worm-like” fossil called a palaeoscolecid, which is an unusual fossil group in North America. The researchers think this discover, from an area in western Utah, can help scientists much better comprehend how diverse the Earths animals were throughout the Cambrian surge.
Jim Schiffbauer, an associate teacher of geological sciences in the MU College of Arts and Science and among the research studys co-authors, stated that while this fossil has the same physiological company as modern-day worms, it does not precisely match with anything we see on modern-day Earth.
” This group of animals are extinct, so we do not see them, or any modern-day relatives, in the world today,” Schiffbauer said. “We tend to call them worm-like since its difficult to state that they perfectly fit with annelids, priapulids, or any other types of organism on earth today that we would generally call a “worm.” Palaeoscolecids have the same basic body plan, which in the history of life has actually been an extremely successful body strategy. So, this is a quite cool addition since it broadens the variety of worm-like things that we understand about from 500 million years back in North America and contributes to our worldwide occurrences and variety of the palaeoscolecids.”
Images of the fossils microscopic plates from an scanning electron microscopic lense. Credit: University of Missouri
At the time, this palaeoscolecid was most likely living on an ocean floor, said Wade Leibach, an MU graduate teaching assistant in the College of Arts and Science, and lead author on the study.
” It is the very first recognized palaeoscolecid discovery in a specific rock development– the Marjum Formation of western Utah– whichs important since this represents one of just a couple of palaeoscolecid taxa in North America,” Leibach said. “Other examples of this kind of fossil have been previously discovered in much higher abundance on other continents, such as Asia, so we think this discover can help us much better understand how we view prehistoric environments and ecologies, such as why various types of organisms are underrepresented or overrepresented in the fossil record. This discovery can be viewed from not just the perspective of its significance in North American paleontology, but likewise wider patterns in paleogeography, paleoecology and development.”
Leibach, who changed his significant from biology to geology after volunteering to work with the invertebrate paleontology collections at the University of Kansas, started this task as an undergraduate student by evaluating a box of about a dozen fossils in the collections of the KU Biodiversity Institute. Leibach and one of his co-authors, Anna Whitaker, who was a graduate trainee at KU at the time and now is at the University of Toronto-Mississauga, examined each fossil utilizing a light microscope, which identified at least one of the fossils to be a palaeoscolecid.
Leibach worked with Julien Kimmig, who was at the KU Biodiversity Institute at the time and is now at Penn State University, to identify that, in order to have the ability to verify their preliminary findings, he would require the assistance of extra analyses provided by advanced microscopy devices situated at the MU X-ray Microanalysis Core, which is directed by Schiffbauer. Utilizing the core center at MU, Leibach focused his analysis on the imprints left in the fossil by the ancient animals microscopic plates, which are characteristic of the palaeoscolecids.
” These very little mineralized plates are usually nanometers-to-micrometers in size, so we required the support of the devices in Dr. Schiffbauers lab to be able to study them in detail due to the fact that their orientation, distribution and size is how we classify the organism to the genus and species levels,” Leibach said.
Leibach said the group found a couple factors about why this particular fossil might be discovered in minimal quantities in North America as compared to other parts of the world. They are:
Geochemical constraints or various environments that may be more predisposed to protecting these kinds of organisms.
Ecological competitors, which may have driven this kind of organism to be less competitive or less plentiful in specific areas.
Numerous scientists consider the “Cambrian surge”– which occurred about 530-540 million years back– as the first major appearance of many of the worlds animal groups in the fossil record. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri have found a rare, 500-million-year-old “worm-like” fossil called a palaeoscolecid, which is an uncommon fossil group in North America.” It is the very first recognized palaeoscolecid discovery in a particular rock development– the Marjum Formation of western Utah– and thats important because this represents one of just a couple of palaeoscolecid taxa in North America,” Leibach said. “Other examples of this type of fossil have actually been previously found in much greater abundance on other continents, such as Asia, so we believe this find can assist us better comprehend how we see prehistoric environments and ecologies, such as why different types of organisms are underrepresented or overrepresented in the fossil record. Financing was supplied by a National Science Foundation CAREER grant (1652351 ), a National Science Foundation Earth Sciences Instrumentation and Facilities grant (1636643 ), a University of Kansas Undergraduate Research grant, a student research study grant provided by the South-Central Section of the Geological Society of America, and the J. Ortega-Hernández Laboratory for Invertebrate Palaeobiology at Harvard University.
The new taxon is called Arrakiscolex aasei after the imaginary world Arrakis in the novel “Dune” by Frank Herbert, which is inhabited by a species of armored worm and the collector of the specimens Arvid Aase.
Recommendation: “First palaeoscolecid from the Cambrian (Miaolingian, Drumian) Marjum Formation of western Utah” by Wade W. Leibach, Rudy Lerosey-Aubril, Anna F. Whitaker, James D. Schiffbauer and Julien Kimmig, 6 September 2021, Acta Palaeontologica Polonica.DOI: 10.4202/ app.00875.2021.
The study was released in Acta Palaeontologica Polonica, a worldwide quarterly journal which publishes documents from all locations of paleontology. Financing was provided by a National Science Foundation CAREER grant (1652351 ), a National Science Foundation Earth Sciences Instrumentation and Facilities grant (1636643 ), a University of Kansas Undergraduate Research grant, a trainee research study grant provided by the South-Central Section of the Geological Society of America, and the J. Ortega-Hernández Laboratory for Invertebrate Palaeobiology at Harvard University. The research studys authors want to thank Arvid Aase and Thomas T. Johnson for contributing the specimens examined in the research study.
Keep in mind: Palaeoscolecid is noticable “pale-Eo-sko-les-sid.”.