Deep-sea protists may explain trace fossil evidence attributed to ancient animals

Saturday, November 22, 2008 - 13:49 in Paleontology & Archaeology

A new discovery challenges one of the strongest arguments in favor of the idea that animals with bilateral symmetry—those that, like us, have two halves that are roughly mirror images of each other—existed before their obvious appearance in the fossil record during the early Cambrian, some 542 million years ago. In the November 25th issue of Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, researchers report the first evidence that trace fossils interpreted by some as the tracks of ancient bilaterians could have instead been made by giant deep-sea protists, like those that can still be found at the seafloor to this day.

Read the whole article on Biology News Net

More from Biology News Net

Latest Science Newsletter

Get the latest and most popular science news articles of the week in your Inbox! It's free!

Check out our next project, Biology.Net