'Fishapod' reveals origins of head and neck structures of first land animals
Wednesday, October 15, 2008 - 13:21
in Paleontology & Archaeology
Newly exposed parts of Tiktaalik roseae--the intermediate fossil between fish and the first animals to walk out of water onto land 375 million years ago--are revealing how this major evolutionary event happened. A new study, published this week in Nature, provides a detailed look at the internal head skeleton of Tiktaalik roseae and reveals a key intermediate step in the transformation of the skull that accompanied the shift to life on land by our distant ancestors.