Posted on 05/28/2011 7:47:24 AM PDT by SunkenCiv
The creatures, known as anomalocaridids, were already thought to be the largest animals of the Cambrian period, known for the "Cambrian Explosion" that saw the sudden appearance of all the major animal groups and the establishment of complex ecosystems about 540 to 500 million years ago. Fossils from this period suggested these marine predators grew to be about two feet long. Until now, scientists also thought these strange invertebrates -- which had long spiny head limbs presumably used to snag worms and other prey, and a circlet of plates around the mouth -- died out at the end of the Cambrian.
Now a team led by former Yale researcher Peter Van Roy (now at Ghent University in Belgium) and Derek Briggs, director of the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, has discovered a giant fossilized anomalocaridid that measures one meter (more than three feet) in length. The anomalocaridid fossils reveal a series of blade like filaments in each segment across the animal's back, which scientists think might have functioned as gills.
In addition, the creature dates back to the Ordovician period, a time of intense biodiversification that followed the Cambrian, meaning these animals existed for 30 million years longer than previously realized.
The specimens are just part of a new trove of fossils from Morocco that includes thousands of examples of soft-bodied marine fauna dating back to the early Ordovician period, 488 to 472 million years ago.
(Excerpt) Read more at physorg.com ...
Saw one of those things break its way out of a guy’s chest once; not a pretty sight.
Luckily we nuked it from orbit. It was the only way to be sure.
These creatures had to die off eventually. Could you imagine having to say, “that guy is a Anomalocarididamaniac.”?
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