Latest news with #Mosurafentoni
The Hindu
25-05-2025
- Science
- The Hindu
What is Mosura fentoni?
Scientists have uncovered a strange new Cambrian sea creature called Mosura fentoni in Canada's famous Burgess shale. M. fentoni is a radiodont, a distant relative of today's insects, crabs, and spiders, yet it breaks several rules thought to define that group. M. fentoni shows that even small Cambrian radiodonts could be highly specialised swimmers with advanced breathing systems, adding a new chapter to the story of how arthropods became so diverse. M. fentoni's body is unusually long for its small size (1.5-6 cm). Its body has 26 segments in three zones. A short neck supports the head. A mesotrunk of six paddle-shaped flaps work like propellers for swimming; and a posterotrunk of up to 16 segments is packed with rows of thin gills while its flaps shrink to stubs. Because the gills dominate this rear zone, researchers have said the posterotrunk is a special breathing tagma — a striking parallel to the oxygen-collecting tails of horseshoe crabs. When the team placed M. fentoni in a family tree, it landed near the base of the hurdiid radiodonts. That position together with its highly divided body suggests early radiodonts were already experimenting with different ways to split and specialise their segments. That is, this ability, which later exploded in crabs, insects and other arthropods, may have been rooted in these ancient predators.
Winnipeg Free Press
21-05-2025
- Science
- Winnipeg Free Press
Fascinating new fossil provides insight into evolution of arthropods
In his office piled high with papers, behind a desk strewn with specimens, Joe Moysiuk, curator of paleontology and geology at the Manitoba Museum, turns a fossil over in his hands. 'You never really know what you'll uncover when you head into the field,' he says, grinning. 'That's what keeps it exciting — the chance to piece together something that reshapes how we understand life's earliest history.' MIKAELA MACKENZIE / FREE PRESS Joe Moysiuk, curator of paleontology and geology at the Manitoba Museum, said the discovery of the new fossil shows that arthropods evolved in more varied ways than we previously thought. He gestures toward an illustration of his latest discovery, Mosura fentoni. 'This little creature might seem insignificant at just five or six centimetres long, but its features tell an incredible story. Three eyes, a unique segmented body and flap-like structures — nothing like it exists today,' he says. 'The more we study it, the clearer it becomes that arthropods evolved in more varied ways than we previously thought.' Mosura fentoni is a new genus from the Burgess Shale in British Columbia, detailed in his upcoming paper, Early evolvability in arthropod tagmosis exemplified by a new radiodont from the Burgess Shale (co-authored with Jean-Bernard Caron, University of Toronto), in Royal Society Open Science. 'This animal is incredible. It has compound eyes, a third eye positioned at the front and flap-like structures that resemble moth wings, but were used for swimming instead. The back of its body looks like an insect's abdomen, specialized in a way we hadn't seen in radiodonts (an extinct form of invertebrate predator) before,' Moysiuk says. Mosura has 16 segments lined with gills at the rear end of its body, a feature that converges with modern creatures such as horseshoe crabs, woodlice and insects, which have respiratory organs at the rear of the body. The reason for this adaptation is unknown, but researchers theorize it may be related to particular habitat preference or behaviour of Mosura that called for more efficient respiration. 'This little creature might seem insignificant… but its features tell an incredible story… nothing like it exists today.'–Joe Moysiuk The animal's vague similarity to a moth inspired its discoverers to 'have a bit of a fun' when naming it, Moysiuk says. ''Mosura' is a nod to the Japanese movie monster Mothra, and 'fentoni' honours one of our longtime ROM (Royal Ontario Museum) colleagues,' he says. Moysiuk flips through a series of photos taken under different lighting conditions, revealing intricate features of the fossil, which has a circular, tooth-filled mouth and spiny claws. 'One image shows the external features — the dark outline of the body. Another captures reflective patches extending into the swimming flaps. These remnants of circulatory structures help us understand how early arthropods transported oxygen,' he explains. Instead of arteries and veins, Mosura had an open circulatory system; its heart pumped blood into large internal body cavities. The preservation of these structures confirms the ancient origin of this type of system, Moysiuk says. The fossils in the Burgess Shale — dating from the Cambrian Period, approximately 508 million years ago — are famous for their well-preserved soft parts, showing details such as eyeballs and brains. 'The Burgess Shale has been known since 1909, when Charles Walcott discovered it,' Moysiuk says of the site located in Yoho National Park and Kootenay National Park in British Columbia. Danielle Dufault / Royal Ontario Museum Life An artistic rendering of what Mosura fentoni would have looked like. 'The preservation here is phenomenal — eyes, guts, even an animal's last meal trapped inside its stomach.' His own connection to the site runs deep, dating to his first expedition in 2014 when Moysiuk was still an undergraduate. 'We had just discovered a new Burgess Shale site in Marble Canyon, in Kootenay National Park, south of the original one Yoho National Park site. Twenty per cent of the species we found at Marble Canyon were previously unknown,' he says. He pauses, tapping a cabinet in his office. 'Some of the specimens we studied for this paper were collected back in 2014; others date even earlier. It's a long process. Years of collecting, followed by years of research and writing.' Down the hall, in the Collection Room, Moysiuk slides open another towering cabinet, revealing mammoth tusks, ancient bison skulls and rare fossils that yield fragments of prehistoric life. MIKAELA MACKENZIE / FREE PRESS A eurypterid 'scorpion' found in Grand Rapids, Man., represents a new species that has yet to be named. 'Every specimen has a story, from how they were found to what they reveal about natural history ' Moysiuk says, following the outline of a tusk with one finger. He steps back, scanning the room. 'So many of us live in cities now, disconnected from the natural world. Museums help bridge that gap. They let people experience things they might never see otherwise,' he says. Back in his office, surrounded by maps from past expeditions, he smiles. 'Evolution is full of surprises. These fossils challenge us to rethink long-held assumptions, and when you get the chance to be part of that process, to rewrite even a small piece of Earth's history, it's pretty special,' Moysiuk says. Wednesdays A weekly look towards a post-pandemic future. He gestures to his desk, buried beneath research materials. 'It's a puzzle, piecing together the story of these ancient creatures,' he says. MIKAELA MACKENZIE / FREE PRESS Moysiuk shows off some of the Manitoba Museum's collection of fossils. 'It's sharing these stories with colleagues and the public that's always the greatest reward.' A specimen of Mosura will go on display at the Manitoba Museum this fall. arts@ Joe Moysiuk, curator of paleontology and geology at the Manitoba Museum, notes that he's also an evolutionary biologist with research interests in macroevolution, evolutionary developmental biology and the origin of animal body plans. 'I am passionate about natural history and collections-based research,' says the curator, who is also an adjunct professor at the University of Saskatchewan and a research associate at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto (his hometown). 'My work frequently combines systematics with the assessment of various broader evolutionary questions related to animal origins,' says the scientist, who has published papers in influential journals such as Nature and Current Biology. Moysiuk has travelled to important Paleozoic fossil sites in Manitoba, Ontario, British Columbia and the eastern United States. 'I am especially interested in sites exhibiting exceptional preservation, and have led the description of new occurrences of rare soft-tissue preservation,' Moysiuk says. His most recent work, Early evolvability in arthropod tagmosis exemplified by a new radiodont from the Burgess Shale, co-authored with Jean-Bernard Caron, was published in the Royal Society Open Science on May 14.
Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Three-eyed ancient predator ‘unlike any living animal' discovered
Scientists examining a rare fossil found in Canada's Burgess Shale have discovered a predator with three eyes that lived over 500 million years ago. The fossil species, named Mosura fentoni for resembling the fictional Japanese kaiju Mothra, was about the size of an index finger with three eyes, spiny jointed claws, a circular mouth lined with teeth, and a body with swimming flaps along its sides, researchers from the Royal Ontario Museum said. Mosura fentoni, also dubbed 'sea moth' due to its broad swimming flaps and narrow abdomen, was a member of an extinct group of animals called radiodonts, which included the meter-long marine predator Anomalocaris canadensis. It was, researchers said, 'unlike any living animal'. Mosura had a unique abdomen-like body region with multiple segments at its back end, according to a new study published in the journal Royal Society Open Science. 'This is a neat example of evolutionary convergence with modern groups like horseshoe crabs, woodlice, and insects, which share a batch of segments bearing respiratory organs at the rear of the body," study co-author Joe Moysiuk said. Scientists said it was not clear why Mosura had this unique body adaptation but suspected it could be related to a particular habitat preference requiring more efficient respiration. It was distantly related to modern moths and belonged to a deeper branch of arthropods including spiders, crabs and millipedes. "Radiodonts were the first group of arthropods to branch out in the evolutionary tree, so they provide key insight into ancestral traits for the entire group,' Jean-Bernard Caron, another author of the study, said. 'The new species emphasises these early arthropods were already surprisingly diverse and were adapting in a comparable way to their distant modern relatives.' Mosura did not have arteries and veins, but an "open" circulatory system that involved the heart pumping blood into large internal body cavities called lacunae. "The well-preserved lacunae of the circulatory system in Mosura help us to interpret similar, but less clear features that we've seen before in other fossils,' Dr Moysiuk said. The Burgess Shale fossil grounds in Canada's Yoho and Kootenay National Parks are recognised as Unesco World Heritage Sites. 'Very few fossil sites in the world offer this level of insight into soft internal anatomy. We can see traces representing bundles of nerves in the eyes that would have been involved in image processing, just like in living arthropods,' Dr Caron said, adding that the 'details are astounding'.
Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Three-eyed ancient predator ‘unlike any living animal' discovered
Scientists examining a rare fossil found in Canada's Burgess Shale have discovered a predator with three eyes that lived over 500 million years ago. The fossil species, named Mosura fentoni for resembling the fictional Japanese kaiju Mothra, was about the size of an index finger with three eyes, spiny jointed claws, a circular mouth lined with teeth, and a body with swimming flaps along its sides, researchers from the Royal Ontario Museum said. Mosura fentoni, also dubbed 'sea moth' due to its broad swimming flaps and narrow abdomen, was a member of an extinct group of animals called radiodonts, which included the meter-long marine predator Anomalocaris canadensis. It was, researchers said, 'unlike any living animal'. Mosura had a unique abdomen-like body region with multiple segments at its back end, according to a new study published in the journal Royal Society Open Science. 'This is a neat example of evolutionary convergence with modern groups like horseshoe crabs, woodlice, and insects, which share a batch of segments bearing respiratory organs at the rear of the body," study co-author Joe Moysiuk said. Scientists said it was not clear why Mosura had this unique body adaptation but suspected it could be related to a particular habitat preference requiring more efficient respiration. It was distantly related to modern moths and belonged to a deeper branch of arthropods including spiders, crabs and millipedes. "Radiodonts were the first group of arthropods to branch out in the evolutionary tree, so they provide key insight into ancestral traits for the entire group,' Jean-Bernard Caron, another author of the study, said. 'The new species emphasises these early arthropods were already surprisingly diverse and were adapting in a comparable way to their distant modern relatives.' Mosura did not have arteries and veins, but an "open" circulatory system that involved the heart pumping blood into large internal body cavities called lacunae. "The well-preserved lacunae of the circulatory system in Mosura help us to interpret similar, but less clear features that we've seen before in other fossils,' Dr Moysiuk said. The Burgess Shale fossil grounds in Canada's Yoho and Kootenay National Parks are recognised as Unesco World Heritage Sites. 'Very few fossil sites in the world offer this level of insight into soft internal anatomy. We can see traces representing bundles of nerves in the eyes that would have been involved in image processing, just like in living arthropods,' Dr Caron said, adding that the 'details are astounding'.
New York Post
20-05-2025
- Science
- New York Post
Paleontologists discover ‘moth-like' predator ‘the size of your index finger' that lived 506M years ago
Paleontologists recently discovered a 506-million-year-old 'moth-like' predator that lurked in prehistoric Canada. In a press release from the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM), officials identified the creature as Mosura fentoni, an extinct arthropod, as news agencies including SWNS reported. Advertisement The museum reported that most of the Mosura fossils were collected by ROM paleontologists at Raymond Quarry in Yoho National Park in British Columbia. Most were found between 1975 and 2022. 'Mosura fentoni was about the size of your index finger and had three eyes, spiny jointed claws, a circular mouth lined with teeth and a body with swimming flaps along its sides,' the museum noted. 'These traits show it to be part of an extinct group known as the radiodonts, which also included the famous Anomalocaris canadensis, a meter-long predator that shared the waters with Mosura.' Advertisement What makes the discovery so interesting to researchers is that Mosura had an abdomen-like body region made up of multiple segments at its back end – which had not been previously observed in any radiodonts. 3 Paleontologists recently discovered a 506-million-year-old 'moth-like' predator that lurked in prehistoric Canada. Royal Ontario Museum Joe Moysiuk, a curator of paleontology and geology at the Manitoba Museum, said Mosurahad 16 of these segments, all lined with gills. 'This is a neat example of evolutionary convergence with modern groups, like horseshoe crabs, woodlice and insects, which share a batch of segments bearing respiratory organs at the rear of the body,' Moysiuk described. Advertisement The museum reported that the species has been nicknamed the 'sea-moth' by field collectors based on its moth-like attributes. 3 Officials identified the creature as Mosura fentoni, an extinct arthropod. Royal Ontario Museum 'This inspired its scientific name, which references the fictional Japanese kaiju also known as Mothra. Only distantly related to real moths – as well as spiders, crabs, and millipedes – Mosura belongs on a much deeper branch in the evolutionary tree of these animals, collectively known as arthropods,' the statement added. Interestingly, the fossils show details of Mosura's internal anatomy – including its nervous system, circulatory system, and digestive tract. Advertisement Instead of arteries and veins, Mosura's heart pumped blood into large internal body cavities called lacunae. 3 Most of the Mosura fossils were collected by ROM paleontologists at Raymond Quarry in Yoho National Park in British Columbia. VW Pics/Universal Images Group via Getty Images ROM curator Jean-Bernard Caron said that 'few fossil sites in the world offer this level of insight into soft internal anatomy.' 'We can see traces representing bundles of nerves in the eyes that would have been involved in image processing, just like in living arthropods,' the expert added. 'The details are astounding.'
