The first study to evaluate the biodiversity of arthropods in U.S. homes finds that humans share their houses with any of more than 500 different kinds of arthropods – at least on a short-term basis. Arthropods are invertebrate animals with exoskeletons, segmented bodies and jointed limbs, such as insects, spiders, mites and centipedes.(more…)
Scientists have found 450-million-year-old fossilized crustaceans entombed with their eggs and newly hatched offspring. At least one of the animals is a newly identified species.
The tiny ostracods — arthropods related to shrimps, lobsters, and crabs — were buried by a mudslide in an area of upstate New York, near Rome, at a time when the entire region was deep underwater. In one specimen, both eggs and early embryos are present with the adult female. (more…)
Complex brains evolved much earlier than previously thought, as evidenced by a 520-million-year-old fossilized arthropod with remarkably well-preserved brain structures.
The remarkably well-preserved fossil of an extinct arthropod shows that anatomically complex brains evolved earlier than previously thought and have changed little over the course of evolution. According to University of Arizona neurobiologist Nicholas Strausfeld, who co-authored the study describing the specimen, the fossil is the earliest known to show a brain.
The discovery will be published in the Oct. 11 issue of the journal Nature. (more…)
Washington, D.C.— Surprising new research shows that, contrary to conventional belief, remains of chitin-protein complex—structural materials containing protein and polysaccharide—are present in abundance in fossils of arthropods from the Paleozoic era. Previously the oldest molecular signature of chitin-protein complex was discovered in 25 million year old Cenozoic fossils and remnants of structural protein have also been discovered in 80 million-year-old Mesozoic fossils. Carnegie’s George Cody and an international team of scientists discovered relicts of protein-chitin complex in fossils of arthropods from the Paleozoic era. Their findings, published online by Geology, could have major implications for our understanding of the organic fossil record. (more…)