'Living Fossil' Thought Extinct For 273 Million Years Found Thriving on Ocean Floor

[Judi Lynn]

(Zapalski et al., Palaeogeogr. Palaeoclimatol. Palaeoecol., 2021)
NATURE

MICHELLE STARR10 MAY 2021

A symbiotic relationship between two marine lifeforms has just been discovered thriving at the bottom of the ocean, after disappearing from the fossil record for hundreds of millions of years.

Scientists have found non-skeletal corals growing from the stalks of marine animals known as crinoids, or sea lilies, on the floor of the Pacific Ocean, off the coasts of Honshu and Shikoku in Japan.

"These specimens represent the first detailed records and examinations of a recent syn vivo association of a crinoid (host) and a hexacoral (epibiont)," the researchers wrote in their paper, "and therefore analyses of these associations can shed new light on our understanding of these common Paleozoic associations."

During the Paleozoic era, crinoids and corals seem to have gotten along very well indeed. The seafloor fossil record is full of it, yielding countless examples of corals overgrowing crinoid stems to climb above the seafloor into the water column, to stronger ocean currents for filter-feeding.

More:
https://www.sciencealert.com/living-fossil-thought-extinct-for-273-million-years-found-thriving-on-the-ocean-floor

[eppur_se_muova]

1. I was hoping it was a blastoid.

Crinoids survived, why not blastoids ?

OK, I'm kind of goofy over blastoids. But then I'm from Alabama, "the Pentremites State"

?

?w=365&ssl=1

[Judi Lynn]

3. Glad you posted an illustration. Had to see more, and was even more amazed:

Symmetrical, like flowers, and snowflakes, etc. Interesting, beautiful. Overwhelming.

Thank you.

[eppur_se_muova]

7. More like starfish, urchins, sand dollars -- i.e. echinoderms.

Not to mention crinoids, as in the article -- they are living fossils by themselves !

Blastoids are extinct members of the phylum Echinodermata. Perhaps it is that five-fold symmetry that catches the eye.

Fine old engraving. Thanks for sharing.

[TexasBushwhacker]

13. I find diatoms fascinating

Single celled algae that have cell walls of silica, rather than cellulose. They look other worldly to me.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

14. Related to Graboids?

[burrowowl]

2. Thanks for link

[Judi Lynn]

4. Thank you, burrowowl. 🦉

[GReedDiamond]

5. Looks kinda like a shrimp - EAT IT!!

Deep deeep deeeep deeeeep deeeeeep fried.

Disclaimer: I do not eat actual shrimp. Nor fake ones, fried or otherwise.

[tavernier]

12. I net them from my dive platform

and toss them directly in to the boiling pot on my stove in my galley. Right out of the ocean they are sweet as sugar. Melted butter and lemon. But not this time of the year. The weather has to be cold and blustery. Makes them even more delicious.

Shrimp, that is.

[GReedDiamond]

15. At first, I was thinkin' U were x-plainin' a tasty recipe 4 the "Living Fossil...

...Thought Extinct For 273 Million Years."

But, apparently, if I got this right, yer talkin' 'bout SHRIMP, not them damn pesky 273 million years ole shoulda been ex-stink-creechers in the pitcher of the OP.

Just like the ones I got in my pitcher.

Goddammit! Now I'm all cold and blustery!!

[tavernier]

16. Nope, I don't eat anything that ex-stinks.

No danger of exstinking shrimp. You got your fried shrimp, boiled shrimp, bar-b-cued shrimp, shrimp and grits......

[KS Toronado]

17. You quoting Bubba to Forrest Gump?

[tavernier]

18. Yup.

Family entertainment every time I serve shrimp. We are easily amused here in the tropics.

[eShirl]

6. It's a plumbus!

https://rickandmorty.fandom.com/wiki/Plumbus

[Shanti Shanti Shanti]

8. I was hoping it was one of these...

[littlemissmartypants]

9. ❤ nt

[Kid Berwyn]

10. I should have been a pair of ragged claws

Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

— From “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by T. S. ELIOT

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/44212/the-love-song-of-j-alfred-prufrock

[Martin68]

11. Very cool.

[alfredo]

19. The kid in me was hoping for a Trilobite