Meet our earliest known ancestor, Saccorhytus coronarious!
Scientists at Cambridge Uni have recently discovered our earliest known ancestor, dating from 540 million years ago.
Measuring a tiny 1mm in length, it’s thought to be the most primitive member of an animal group called deuterostomes. So, this means that these creatures are the starting point in a long evolutionary chain leading to humans, starfish and rabbits.
Named S_accorhytus Coronarious_ after its wrinkly sack-like appearance (lol), it’s defining features are its huuuuuge mouth, and perhaps most bizarrely, its lack of anus. Although Simon Conway Morris, palaeontologist (yep, like Ross from FRIENDS) and co-author of the research admits that it’s possible that they haven’t found the anus yet and that apparently other creatures also don’t have them. So many questions.
Conway Morris said “When you look at them under the microscope they look like tiny grains of black rice, frankly – they are pretty uninteresting – but as soon as you put them under the electron microscope, the detail becomes absolutely phenomenal.”
It’s been a while since I last looked in the mirror but I’m struggling to spot any resemblances…
The research was published in Nature journal
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.