Using high-resolution CT and synchrotron scanning, paleontologists confirmed that the fossilized specimen from the Early Triassic of the South African Karoo Basin contains an unborn dicynodont Lystrosaurus, resolving a long-standing mystery about whether early mammal ancestors laid eggs. The researchers suggest the dicynodont eggs were likely soft-shelled, explaining why they have remained elusive for so…
An assemblage of more than 700 Ediacaran fossils from the end of the Ediacaran period indicates that key animal groups — including early relatives of vertebrates — were already diversifying millions of years earlier than long believed. Reconstruction of the Jiangchuan Biota. Image credit: Xiaodong Wang. The burst of animal diversification spanning the transition from…
Deep inside a limestone cave in western Cuba, paleontologists have found the most complete ichthyosaur skeleton yet found on the island. Ophthalmosaurid ichthyosaurs. Image credit: Dmitry Bogdanov / CC BY 3.0. The ichthyosaur skeleton was discovered in 2023 in a fluvial cave in El Cuajaní, within the Viñales Geopark and National Park in western Cuba….
Paleontologists at Harvard University have described a large predatory arthropod from the Middle Cambrian of Utah featuring massive three-segmented chelicerae. Named Megachelicerax cousteaui, this soft-bodied animal represents the earliest known member of the chelicerates, pushing back the origins of spiders, scorpions, horseshoe crabs, and sea spiders by 20 million years. The surprisingly complex anatomy of…
Paleontologists have identified a new genus and species of fossil ape that lived about 17-18 million years ago in northern Egypt. The discovery suggests that the ancestors of modern apes — and humans — may have emerged not in East Africa, but at a crossroads between Africa and Eurasia. Life reconstruction of Masripithecus moghraensis. Image…
Known from a single skull discovered in South Africa in 1952, Cistecynodon parvus has been shuffled across the evolutionary tree: described at various times as a close relative of advanced cynodonts, a juvenile of another species and even something outside the group altogether. Now, a new study using computed tomography (CT) scans to digitally reconstruct…
Paleontologists have described a new species of enigmatic cyclidan crustacean on the basis of three well-preserved specimens from the Early Triassic Guiyang biota of China. Yunnanocyclus fortis. Image credit: Sun et al., doi: 10.1002/spp2.70052. Cyclidans are a distinctive group of arthropods that first appeared in the Carboniferous period and survived until the Late Cretaceous. Their…
Paleontologists analyzing fossils from Ethiopia have described a previously unknown crocodile species that shared the landscape with a hominid species called Australopithecus afarensis. Named Crocodylus lucivenator, the formidable predator may have stalked Australopithecus afarensis at watering holes in the wetlands and woodlands of the Pliocene. Crocodylus lucivenator overlapped with the famed Lucy and her hominin…
Fossil jaws of the ancient monkey species Stirtonia victoriae from the La Victoria Formation in Colombia suggest that a shift toward leaf-eating allowed early primates in South America to grow larger and occupy new ecological niches. The discovery may also hint at when the lineage developed the anatomical features that later produced the powerful howls…
