Discovery points to our fishy heritage
Aussie Gogonasus was transitional
A primitive fish that swam in tropical reef systems before life clambered up on land had more advanced features than previously thought, a new study finds.
Scientists led by John Long of the Museum Victoria in Melbourne, Australia, discovered the first complete fossil of a Gogonasus fish last year in a limestone formation in Western Australia. Prior to the new discovery, only parts of Gogonasus, including a snout and part of a skull, had been found.
The newly discovered fossil “has all these remarkable details preserved that none of the other specimens could show,” Long said.
The specimen, whose middle ear and limbs resemble those of land vertebrates, could be one of the missing links between fish and four-legged land vertebrates, bringing researchers closer to the point when life reached the water’s edge.
The finding, detailed in the Oct. 19 issue of the journal Nature, could provide valuable clues about our fishy heritage, scientists say.
Gogonasus was an ambush predator, about 12 inches long, that trolled tropical reefs during the Devonian period or the “Age of Fishes.” Once the species died out, the skeletons got buried by layers of shale in what is called the Gogo Formation.
It’s fins were less-derived than last year’s Tiktaalik.
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