A new study, led by paleontologists at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) is helping resolve the evolution and ecology of Odaraia, a taco-shaped marine animal that lived during the Cambrian period.
A new study, led by paleontologists at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) is helping resolve the evolution and ecology of Odaraia, a taco-shaped marine animal that lived during the Cambrian period.
Fossils collected by ROM reveal Odaraia had mandibles. Paleontologists are finally able to place it as belonging to the mandibulates, ending its long enigmatic classification among the arthropods since it was first discovered in the Burgess Shale over 100 years ago and revealing more about early evolution and diversification.
The study « The Cambrian Odaraia alata and the colonization of nektonic suspension-feeding niches by early mandibulates
» was published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.
The study authors were able to identify a pair of large appendages with grasping jagged edges near its mouth, clearly indicative of mandibles, which are one of the key and distinctive features of the mandibulate group of animals.
This suggests that Odaraia was one of the earliest known members of this group. The researchers made another stunning discovery; a detailed analysis of its more than 30 pairs of legs, found an intricate system of small and large spines. According to the authors, these spines could intertwine, capturing smaller prey as though a fishing net, suggesting how some of these first mandibulates left the sea floor and explored the water column, setting the seeds for their future ecological success.
