Ovatiovermis cribratus life restoration. A scientific illustration of Ovatiovermis cribratus shows how this soft - bodied marine animal would have looked like with its front feeding limbs extended.
Credit: Illustrated by Danielle Dufault, Royal Ontario Museum; © Royal Ontario Museum
- Science Daily: 500-million year-old species offers insights into the lives of ancient legged worms
Dr Jean-Bernard Caron, senior curator of invertebrate paleontology at Royal Ontario Museum (ROM), associate professor at the University of Toronto in the Departments of Earth Sciences and Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, and lead author of the study, said: "Ovatiovermis is no longer than my thumb with all limbs stretched out and is only known from two specimens. However this new species provides fantastic new insights into the ecology and relationship of lobopodians, a group of mainly Cambrian marine invertebrates which are key to our understanding of modern tardigrades, onychophorans and the largest group of animals on Earth -- the arthropods."
- SD
Ed: 'no bigger than my thumb?' What kind of monster is that?
Relax, John Boy. With the miracle of clever camera angles, it can easily grow to eat Manhattan. Even Sigourney Weaver will be no match for this one.
Note: you may be amused by the reference to 'modern tardigrades' which represent some of the most primitive creatures in existence and they get airplay sometimes because it's almost impossible to kill them. (WIKI: Tardigrade)
This bug is getting plenty of attention and that's probably not surprising given the lack of content in anything else in the news. RT even has a video although, regrettably, John Carpenter did not shoot it.
- RT: 500mn years old & boasting 30 legs: ‘Worm’ fossil offers insight into ancient species (VIDEO)
Ed: what a crumby video!
Take it easy, John Boy. I'm sure you can make something good, which is to say really dangerous, out of it.
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