As we wind toward the year’s end we often find ourselves thinking about the future, but sometimes it takes a rare nugget from the past to make strides in academia. Take fossils, a dizzying diversity of really, really old stuff that somehow defied decay and decomposition to linger on in a record we can dive into and read hundreds of millions of years into the future.
Such treasures were presented to the world in 2024 that have changed the way we see life on Earth, both in the evolution of animals alive today and the mysterious lifestyles of giant “enigmas” from the past. Here are eight of our favorites from the past year. So, which one is scoring a place on your mantelpiece of dreams?
A 47-Million-Year-Old “Alien Plant” That’s Even Stranger Than We Realized
“This fossil is rare in having the twig with attached fruits and leaves. Usually those are found separately.”
Image credit: Florida Museum of Natural History photo by Jeff Gage
A peculiar cluster of fossils was retrieved from the Green River Formation in Utah back in 1969 – the 47-million-year-old leaves of an “alien plant” that was thought to be an unusual member of the ginseng family. In 2024, the discovery of more alien plant fossils meant scientists were able to revisit the curious botanical, revealing that it isn’t ginseng at all.
The alien plant, as its Latin name nods to, is actually even stranger than first realized, with traits we’ve never seen in modern plants. It belonged to a family that no longer exists, and suggests there’s more diversity in the fossil record of flowering plants than previously recognized. Read the full story.
First-Ever Antarctic Amber Spills Secrets Of The Continent’s Cretaceous Forests
“The analyzed amber fragments allow direct insights into environmental conditions that prevailed in West Antarctica 90 million years ago.”
Image credit: Alfred Wegener Institute/V. Schumacher
A study published in November announced that amber fragments had been recovered from Antarctica for the first time, from an offshore sedimentary basin. The fossils mean we now have amber samples from every continent, and will provide information about Antarctica’s forests, which were once home to hardy dinosaurs.
The ancient pieces of hardened tree resin, known as amber, were found within a 5-centimeter (2-inch) thick layer of lignite (moist coal). Based on the age and composition of the lignite, the amber is estimated to be between 92 and 83 million years old, and came from a swampy forest mostly composed of conifers.
As study author Dr Johann Klages of the Alfred Wegener Institute said in a statement, “Our goal now is to learn more about the forest ecosystem – if it burned down, if we can find traces of life included in the amber. This discovery allows a journey to the past in yet another more direct way.” Read the full story.
Dinosaur-Era Bird Fills A 70-Million-Year Gap In The Evolution Of Bird Intelligence
An almost perfect intermediate between Archaeopteryx and modern birds was discovered with its skull preserved in extraordinary three-dimension. To find such an intact fossil bird that dates back to the Mesozoic is almost unheard of, making the find one of the most significant of its kind, but that’s not all.
The dinosaur-era bird is about the size of a starling, and is being described as a Rossetta Stone for working out how and when the bird brain evolved into the incredibly intelligent processing machine it is today. By recreating its brain, scientists were able to establish that its enlarged cerebrum suggests it was more intelligent than the earliest bird-like dinosaurs, but that it lacked the developed cerebellum seen in modern birds, which is associated with complex flight control. Read the full story.
Frozen Mummy Reveals Woolly Rhinos Had A Hump On Their Back
The camel-like hump tells us ancient art really is a good way of studying ancient life.
For the first time ever, researchers uncovered the mummified remains of a woolly rhinoceros that had a big old hump on the back of its neck (and yes, mummies are a kind of fossil). The hump was curiously absent in all other known specimens of the Ice Age megafauna, and we don’t yet know if it disappeared after childhood.
Big news in the form of a fatty bulge, then, and news that attests to the remarkable accuracy of ancient cave paintings depicting rhinos with hunched backs. The most accurate depictions were made by a Paleolithic artist from Chauvet Cave, and it shows that ancient art can be a good source of information on what life on Earth used to look like – exceptionally impressive when you see my best estimation of a camel. Read the full story.
Fossil Footprints Reveal Big Theropod Dinosaurs Lived Close To The Antarctic Circle
“These numerous tracks are the best evidence yet that these former polar environments supported large carnivores.”
Image credit: Anthony Martin
It was announced that footprints made by large theropod dinosaurs were found on Australia’s south coast this year, dating back to a time when the region was still connected to Antarctica. The prints prove that big dinosaurs lived there when it almost touched the Antarctic Circle, putting the area in near-total darkness for months at a time.
It makes sense that something would have eaten the prey we already knew lived there, but we didn’t know how they survived the winter. Hibernation, migration, or making do with sparse resources are all possible, but the footprints show that, at least at times, medium-sized prey was so abundant that large meat-eaters could make their home in the area. Read the full story.
Exceptional Fossils Spill The Secrets Of “Enigmatic” 10-Meter Sharks Found In Mexico
Exquisitely preserved fossils belonging to Ptychodus – an extinct group of giant sharks – were described this year, having been discovered in Mexico. They may help solve some centuries-old mysteries surrounding what these “enigmas” looked like, what they hunted, and how they fit into the shark evolutionary tree.
The finds encompass complete articulated specimens from the early Late Cretaceous, including a preserved body outline, which provides crucial information about Ptychodus’ mysterious lifestyle and enormous size. Overall, the researchers conclude that Ptychodus was “probably the largest durophagous shark that ever existed”. Read the full story.
Fossil Jaw Bones That May Have Belonged To A Prehistoric Sea Monster The Size Of A Blue Whale
“It is quite remarkable to think that gigantic, blue whale-sized ichthyosaurs were swimming in the oceans around what was the UK during the Triassic Period.”
Image credit: Dr Dean Lomax
A few fragments of jaw bone may have claimed the title of largest marine reptile ever to have lived after a father and daughter fossil-hunting duo found fossils of a new species of ichthyosaur. The beast lived 202 million years ago, and estimations of its size indicate it was around 25 meters (82 feet) in length, making it comparable to today’s blue whales.
“This research has been ongoing for almost eight years,” said ichthyosaur expert Dr Dean Lomax in a statement. “It is quite remarkable to think that gigantic, blue whale-sized ichthyosaurs were swimming in the oceans around what was the UK during the Triassic Period. These jawbones provide tantalising evidence that perhaps one day a complete skull or skeleton of one of these giants might be found. You never know.” Read the full story.
First Fossil Tapeworms Suggests They’ve Been Upsetting Stomachs For At Least 99 Million Years
“The fossil record of tapeworms is extremely sparse due to their soft tissues and endoparasitic habitats, which greatly hampers our understanding of their early evolution.”
Image credit: NIGPAS
A tentacle trapped in amber became the first body fossil of a tapeworm ever discovered this year. The “exceptional” fossil suggests the parasites have been wreaking havoc on intestines since at least the mid-Cretaceous, meaning we can all relate – even in some small, gross way – to the lived experiences of dinosaur-era creatures.
“The fossil record of tapeworms is extremely sparse due to their soft tissues and endoparasitic habitats, which greatly hampers our understanding of their early evolution,” Bo Wang, the lead researcher of a study describing the discovery, said in a statement. Now that his team has “reported the first body fossil of a tapeworm,” we can start to try and piece together the food web that led to it getting trapped in tree resin.
Tapeworms are what’s known as endoparasites, meaning they live inside their hosts (well, except for when they’re hanging out of bears). Trypanorhynchs – the group to which the newly discovered worm belongs – are intestinal interlopers, clinging to their hosts’ guts and absorbing nutrients. As the specimen was found in a near-shore environment, it could be assumed that it was lurking in the bowels of an elasmobranch that was stranded by a tide or storm.
The unfortunate fish may then have been scavenged upon by a land-based predator – perhaps a dinosaur if the palaeoart is anything to go by – which ripped its tentacle free, and allowed it to get trapped in resin. Read the full story.
So, as you can see, we can appreciate the ancient Earth in all kinds of new and unexpected ways thanks to the fossilized bones, plants, and parasites lurking in the fossil record. And as for which one deserves a place on the mantelpiece? Keep your triceratops skull, I’m sticking with the worm.
Source Link: 8 Fossil Discoveries That Changed Our Understanding Of Life On Earth
