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Fossilized spermatozoa preserved in a 50-Myr-old annelid cocoon from Antarctica
The origin and evolution of clitellate annelids—earthworms, leeches and their relatives—is poorly understood, partly because body fossils of these delicate organisms are exceedingly rare. The distinctive egg cases (cocoons) of Clitellata, however, are relatively common in the fossil record, although...
Autores principales: | , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
The Royal Society
2015
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4528455/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26179804 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2015.0431 |
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author | Bomfleur, Benjamin Mörs, Thomas Ferraguti, Marco Reguero, Marcelo A. McLoughlin, Stephen |
author_facet | Bomfleur, Benjamin Mörs, Thomas Ferraguti, Marco Reguero, Marcelo A. McLoughlin, Stephen |
author_sort | Bomfleur, Benjamin |
collection | PubMed |
description | The origin and evolution of clitellate annelids—earthworms, leeches and their relatives—is poorly understood, partly because body fossils of these delicate organisms are exceedingly rare. The distinctive egg cases (cocoons) of Clitellata, however, are relatively common in the fossil record, although their potential for phylogenetic studies has remained largely unexplored. Here, we report the remarkable discovery of fossilized spermatozoa preserved within the secreted wall layers of a 50-Myr-old clitellate cocoon from Antarctica, representing the oldest fossil animal sperm yet known. Sperm characters are highly informative for the classification of extant Annelida. The Antarctic fossil spermatozoa have several features that point to affinities with the peculiar, leech-like ‘crayfish worms' (Branchiobdellida). We anticipate that systematic surveys of cocoon fossils coupled with advances in non-destructive analytical methods may open a new window into the evolution of minute, soft-bodied life forms that are otherwise only rarely observed in the fossil record. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-4528455 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2015 |
publisher | The Royal Society |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-45284552015-08-11 Fossilized spermatozoa preserved in a 50-Myr-old annelid cocoon from Antarctica Bomfleur, Benjamin Mörs, Thomas Ferraguti, Marco Reguero, Marcelo A. McLoughlin, Stephen Biol Lett Palaeontology The origin and evolution of clitellate annelids—earthworms, leeches and their relatives—is poorly understood, partly because body fossils of these delicate organisms are exceedingly rare. The distinctive egg cases (cocoons) of Clitellata, however, are relatively common in the fossil record, although their potential for phylogenetic studies has remained largely unexplored. Here, we report the remarkable discovery of fossilized spermatozoa preserved within the secreted wall layers of a 50-Myr-old clitellate cocoon from Antarctica, representing the oldest fossil animal sperm yet known. Sperm characters are highly informative for the classification of extant Annelida. The Antarctic fossil spermatozoa have several features that point to affinities with the peculiar, leech-like ‘crayfish worms' (Branchiobdellida). We anticipate that systematic surveys of cocoon fossils coupled with advances in non-destructive analytical methods may open a new window into the evolution of minute, soft-bodied life forms that are otherwise only rarely observed in the fossil record. The Royal Society 2015-07 /pmc/articles/PMC4528455/ /pubmed/26179804 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2015.0431 Text en http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ © 2015 The Authors. Published by the Royal Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/, which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited. |
spellingShingle | Palaeontology Bomfleur, Benjamin Mörs, Thomas Ferraguti, Marco Reguero, Marcelo A. McLoughlin, Stephen Fossilized spermatozoa preserved in a 50-Myr-old annelid cocoon from Antarctica |
title | Fossilized spermatozoa preserved in a 50-Myr-old annelid cocoon from Antarctica |
title_full | Fossilized spermatozoa preserved in a 50-Myr-old annelid cocoon from Antarctica |
title_fullStr | Fossilized spermatozoa preserved in a 50-Myr-old annelid cocoon from Antarctica |
title_full_unstemmed | Fossilized spermatozoa preserved in a 50-Myr-old annelid cocoon from Antarctica |
title_short | Fossilized spermatozoa preserved in a 50-Myr-old annelid cocoon from Antarctica |
title_sort | fossilized spermatozoa preserved in a 50-myr-old annelid cocoon from antarctica |
topic | Palaeontology |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4528455/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26179804 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2015.0431 |
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