Three-Eyed "Sea-Moth" Predator From 506 Million Years Ago Stuns Scientists

[erronis]

https://scitechdaily.com/three-eyed-sea-moth-predator-from-506-million-years-ago-stuns-scientists/

Meet Mosura fentoni, a bizarre 506-million-year-old “sea-moth” with three eyes, claws, and an abdomen full of gills. This ancient predator sheds light on arthropod evolution and reveals stunning internal anatomy from a fossil site like no other. Credit: Danielle Dufault, © ROM, edited

A newly uncovered 506-million-year-old creature called Mosura fentoni is rewriting the story of early ocean life.

With three eyes, tooth-lined jaws, and gill-lined abdominal segments, it’s a strange but telling fossil from the Burgess Shale.

A New Predator Emerges From Deep Time

Paleontologists from the Manitoba Museum and the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) have uncovered an extraordinary new predator that lived over 500 million years ago. This fascinating creature, named Mosura fentoni, was found in Canada’s famous Burgess Shale fossil beds, and the discovery is detailed in the journal Royal Society Open Science.

About the size of a human index finger, Mosura had three eyes, sharp spiny claws, a circular mouth ringed with teeth, and rows of flaps along its sides that likely helped it swim. These features place it in the radiodont group, an extinct line of ancient sea predators that includes the more famous Anomalocaris canadensis, a giant of the Cambrian seas.

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Whoops! This should have been posted in Science or Paleobiology.

[dalton99a]

1. A wide lens, an ultra-wide, and a telephoto lens - just like your cellphone

[Jerry2144]

2. Keith Richards of the Stones has a couple as pets

When he was a lad