World's oldest bug is fossil millipede from Scotland (2024)
A 425-million-year-old millipede fossil from the Scottish island of Kerrera is the world's oldest "bug" -- older than any known fossil of an insect, arachnid or other related creepy-crawly, according to researchers at The University of Texas at Austin.
The findings offer new evidence about the origin and evolution of bugs and plants, suggesting that they evolved much more rapidly than some scientists believe, going from lake-hugging communities to complex forest ecosystems in just 40 million years.
"It's a big jump from these tiny guys to very complex forest communities, and in the scheme of things, it didn't take that long," said Michael Brookfield, a research associate at UT Austin's Jackson School of Geosciences and adjunct professor at the University of Massachusetts Boston. "It seems to be a rapid radiation of evolution from these mountain valleys, down to the lowlands, and then worldwide after that."
The research was recently published in the journal Historical Biology. Brookfield led the study with co-authors including Elizabeth Catlos, an associate professor in the Jackson School's Department of Geological Sciences, and Stephanie Suarez, a doctoral student at the University of Houston who made improvements to the fossil dating technique used in the study when she was an undergraduate at the Jackson School.
The team found that the ancient millipede fossil is 425 million years old, or about 75 million years younger than the age other scientists have estimated the oldest millipede to be using a technique known as molecular clock dating, which is based on DNA's mutation rate. Other research using fossil dating found that the oldest fossil of a land-dwelling, stemmed plant (also from Scotland) is 425 million years old and 75 million years younger than molecular clock estimates.
Although it's certainly possible there are older fossils of both bugs and plants, Brookfield said that the fact they haven't been found -- even in deposits known for preserving delicate fossils from this era -- could indicate that the ancient millipede and plant fossils that have already been discovered are the oldest specimens.
If that's the case, it also means both bugs and plants evolved much more rapidly than the timeline indicated by the molecular clock. Bountiful bug deposits have been dated to just 20 million years later than the fossils. And by 40 million years later, there's evidence of thriving forest communities filled with spiders, insects and tall trees.
"Who is right, us or them?" Catlos said. "We're setting up testable hypotheses -- and this is where we are at in the research right now."
Given their potential evolutionary significance, Brookfield said that he was surprised that this study was the first to address the age of the ancient millipedes.
Suarez said a reason could be the difficulty of extracting zircons -- a microscopic mineral needed to precisely date the fossils -- from the ashy rock sediment in which the fossil was preserved. As an undergraduate researcher at the Jackson School, Suarez developed a technique for separating the zircon grain from this type of sediment. It's a process that takes practice to master. The zircons are easily flushed away when trying to loosen their grip on the sediment. And once they are successfully released from the surrounding rock, retrieving the zircons involves an eagle-eyed hunt with a pin glued to the tip of a pencil.
"That kind of work trained me for the work that I do here in Houston," Suarez said. "It's delicate work."
As an undergraduate, Suarez used the technique to find that a different millipede specimen, thought to be the oldest bug specimen at the time, was about 14 million years younger than estimated -- a discovery that stripped it of the title of oldest bug. Using the same technique, this study passes the distinction along to a new specimen.
The research was funded by the Jackson School, the Max Kade Foundation and DFG Scientific Instrumentation and Information Technology.
The British Geological Survey (BGS) is a partly publicly funded body which aims to advance geoscientific knowledge of the United Kingdom landmass and its continental shelf by means of systematic surveying, monitoring and research. The BGS headquarters are in Keyworth, Nottinghamshire, England.
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › British_Geological_Survey
. A 425-million-year-old millipede fossil from the Scottish island of Kerrera is the world's oldest “bug” — older than any known fossil of an insect, arachnid or other related creepy-crawly, according to researchers at The University of Texas at Austin.
This 425-million-year-old millipede fossil shows these bugs have staying power. Some millipedes can live for years, but one particular millipede inadvertently made paleontology history 425 million years after its demise. The dainty fossil hails from Kerrera, an island in Scotland.
Named Kampecaris obanensis, the prehistoric millipede lived during the Silurian period, about 425 million years ago. The ancient creature was a small (2-3 cm in length), short-bodied animal with three recognizable sections. It likely lived near a lake in a semi-arid forested environment and ate decomposing plants.
The largest-ever fossil of a giant millipede – as big as a car – has been found on a beach in the north of England. The fossil – the remains of a creature called Arthropleura – dates from the Carboniferous Period, about 326 million years ago, over 100 million years before the Age of Dinosaurs.
The oldest known fossils, in fact, are cyanobacteria from Archaean rocks of western Australia, dated 3.5 billion years old. This may be somewhat surprising, since the oldest rocks are only a little older: 3.8 billion years old!
The oldest insect fossil has been proposed to be Rhyniognatha hirsti, estimated to be 400 million years old, but the insect identity of the fossil has been contested.
That's about 100 million years before dinosaurs existed, and now -- thankfully for the creepy-crawly-phobic -- the species is extinct, possibly due to either succumbing to climate change or falling prey to the rise of reptiles, the scientists say.
The earliest known land animal is Pneumodesmus newmani, a species of millipede known from a single fossil specimen, which lived 428 million years ago during the late Silurian Period. It was discovered in 2004, in a layer of sandstone near Stonehaven, in Aberdeenshire, Scotland.
The earliest life forms we know of were microscopic organisms (microbes) that left signals of their presence in rocks about 3.7 billion years old. The signals consisted of a type of carbon molecule that is produced by living things.
Scientists determine age of some of the oldest human bones Some of the oldest human remains ever unearthed are the Omo One bones found in Ethiopia. For decades, their precise age has been debated, but a new study argues they're around 233,000 years old.
The age of Earth is about 4.54 billion years; the earliest undisputed evidence of life on Earth dates from at least 3.5 billion years ago according to the stromatolite record. Some computer models suggest life began as early as 4.5 billion years ago.
Cyanobacteria – the oldest living fossils, emerging 3.5 billion years ago. They exist as single bacteria or in the form of stromatolites, layered rocks produced by colonies of cyanobacteria.
Proterocladus is 200 million years older than the previous earliest-known green seaweed. One of its modern relatives is a type of edible seaweed called sea lettuce. Proterocladus represents the oldest unambiguous green plant fossil.
Grasshoppers are among the most ancient living group of chewing herbivorous insects. The fossil record shows they evolved about 300 million years ago long before the dinosaurs. There are 11,000 named species and they are found worldwide except in Antarctica.
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