For years, researchers were unable to reach a consensus on whether Dickinsonia should be considered an animal, until new research confirmed that it is, in fact, one of the oldest known animals.
YouTubeFossil Dickinsonia.
Dickinsonia were part of the Ediacaran biota, which existed on Earth 20 million years before modern animal life began, in a period known as the Cambrian explosion. It was previously thought that animal life began to evolve only during the Cambrian explosion, and not before, as these findings show.
The Ediacarans are among the earliest examples of complex organisms on the planet. There has been much debate among scientists about whether these organisms can be considered animals.
A Dickinsonia fossil on display.
“The fossil fat molecules we found show that animals were large and abundant millions of years ago, long before we thought,” Brocks said.
The unique creature, Dickinsonia, was oval-shaped with ribbed segments all over its body. According to the Australian National University, it could reach a length of up to 1.4 meters.
The research team speculated that if they could extract molecules from inside the fossil, rather than from the surface, they might be able to determine the composition of the creature that left the fossil.
However, to test the new method, the researchers needed to find fossil Dickinsonia that still contained organic matter.
Ilya Bobrovsky, the paper's lead author, traveled to remote Russian cliffs to extract more Dickinsonia fossils.
“I had to get in a helicopter to get to this extremely remote place where bears and mosquitoes live, and where I was able to find fossil Dickinsonia with preserved organic matter,” Bobrovsky said.
Sourse: www.allthatsinteresting.com
