Proceedings of the Royal Society B<\/a>\u00a0found that the fossil Pohlsepia mazonensis \u2014 a 300-million-year-old sea creature found in the Mazon Creek fossil beds of northeastern Illinois \u2014 was closer to a nautilus than an octopus.<\/p>\nResearchers now believe the creature was a relative of the nautilus, which is a shell-covered cephalopod with tentacles.<\/p>\n
Cephalopods are a class of\u00a0marine animals\u00a0that includes octopuses, squids and cuttlefish, and are known for their tentacles and advanced nervous systems \u2014 and for lacking rigid skeletons.<\/p>\n
The fossil was identified as the world\u2019s oldest octopus in 2000 \u2014 but is now considered the oldest soft-tissue nautilus in the world.<\/p>\n
University of Reading zoologist Thomas Clements, the lead researcher of the new study, told The Associated Press the fossil is a \u201cvery difficult [one] to interpret.\u201d<\/p>\n
He added, \u201cTo look at it, it kind of just looks like a white mush.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you look at it, and you are a cephalopod researcher, and you\u2019re interested in everything octopus, it does superficially look a lot like a deep-water octopus.\u201d<\/p>\n
The determining factor, Clements said, was its teeth \u2014 which researchers examined using a synchrotron to peer inside the fossil.<\/p>\n
They found that each row had 11 teeth \u2014 more than the seven or nine typically found in octopuses.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis has too many teeth, so it can\u2019t be an octopus,\u201d Clements said.<\/p>\nScientists now believe the fossil Pohlsepia mazonensis \u2014 once believed to be the world\u2019s oldest octopus \u2014 is actually more closely related to a nautilus. Dr Thomas Clements \/ SWNS<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\nA diagram of the fossil\u2019s teeth. Dr Thomas Clements \/ SWNS<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\u201cAnd that\u2019s how we realized that the world\u2019s oldest octopus is actually a fossil nautilus, not an octopus.\u201d<\/p>\n
The fossil had the same teeth as a nautiloid called Paleocadmus pohli, an ancient creature found in the same area.<\/p>\n
Researchers say the mix-up likely occurred because the creature decomposed and lost its shell before it was fossilized.<\/p>\n
The next oldest-known octopus fossil is about 90 million years old \u2014 around 210 million years younger than the fossil Pohlsepia mazonensis.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a huge gap,\u201d Clements said, noting it had long raised questions.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd so that big gap got researchers sort of questioning, \u2018Is this thing actually an octopus?’\u201d<\/p>\n
The fossil is currently held in the\u00a0Field Museum in Chicago.\u00a0<\/p>\nA rendering of what Pohlsepia mazonensis might have looked like. Dr Thomas Clements \/ SWNS<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\nPaul Mayer, who manages the museum\u2019s fossil invertebrate collections, said he was \u201ca little surprised\u201d by the new classification, but acknowledged that scientists have questioned the finding for years.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople have been questioning whether it was an octopus ever since the original paper was first published in 2000,\u201d Mayer told the AP.<\/p>\n
He added that the news \u201cis great for our collections, and hopefully new discoveries will be made and new stories will be revealed.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Associated Press contributed reporting.<\/em>\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\nSource link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"More than two decades after scientists identified a fossil as the\u00a0world\u2019s oldest octopus\u00a0\u2014 officials now say it wasn\u2019t one at all. A recent study published in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":49972,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=49971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49971\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/49972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=49971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=49971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=49971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}