In what was once a shallow bay of what is now central Montana, in the Carboniferous (Mississippian) Bear Gulch Lagerstätte, what is now recognized as the oldest ancestors of vampyropods, a group that includes vampire squids and octopuses. The exceptionally well preserved specimen lived between 325 to 328 mya which pushes back the earliest evidence of the group by nearly 82 million years.
Like so many fossil discoveries, it was donated decades ago (1988) to a museum (Royal Ontario Museum in Canada) until it was rediscovered.
The torpedo-like body of the creature is just under 4¾" (12cm) long and possessed fins and rows of suckers to grasp prey, as well as a triangular pen of hard tissue inside its body for support. But what makes it really interesting is that it also had ten "arms" making it the, as lead author Christopher Whalen, a researcher at the American Museum of Natural History and Yale University, noted, the "first and only known vampyropod to possess ten functional appendages." One of the pair of arms were considerably longer than the others, similar to modern-day squids and cuttlefish, and likely were used to capture prey.
The researchers named the creature Syllipsimopodi bideni, derived from the Greek words "syllípsimos" for "prehensile" and "podi" for "foot," along with the species name “bideni” after Joe Biden -- who was inaugurated 46th president of the U.S. when the paper was submitted.
Vampire squids -- which are not squids but close relatives of octopuses -- have eight limbs along with a pair of stringy filaments, thought to be vestigial appendages. The discovery of the ten-limbed Syllipsimopodi bideni supports the contention that all cephalopods originally had ten limbs and that as they evolved over time lost two of them.
Other researchers have urged caution, noting that this new analysis relies heavily on visual methods leaving open many questions which could be resolved with chemical analyses.
Yeah, the picture was upside down in the article too.
The abstract for Fossil coleoid cephalopod from the Mississippian Bear Gulch Lagerstätte sheds light on early vampyropod evolution is below and the full paper can be read by clicking the hyperlink provided.
Like so many fossil discoveries, it was donated decades ago (1988) to a museum (Royal Ontario Museum in Canada) until it was rediscovered.
The torpedo-like body of the creature is just under 4¾" (12cm) long and possessed fins and rows of suckers to grasp prey, as well as a triangular pen of hard tissue inside its body for support. But what makes it really interesting is that it also had ten "arms" making it the, as lead author Christopher Whalen, a researcher at the American Museum of Natural History and Yale University, noted, the "first and only known vampyropod to possess ten functional appendages." One of the pair of arms were considerably longer than the others, similar to modern-day squids and cuttlefish, and likely were used to capture prey.
The researchers named the creature Syllipsimopodi bideni, derived from the Greek words "syllípsimos" for "prehensile" and "podi" for "foot," along with the species name “bideni” after Joe Biden -- who was inaugurated 46th president of the U.S. when the paper was submitted.
Vampire squids -- which are not squids but close relatives of octopuses -- have eight limbs along with a pair of stringy filaments, thought to be vestigial appendages. The discovery of the ten-limbed Syllipsimopodi bideni supports the contention that all cephalopods originally had ten limbs and that as they evolved over time lost two of them.
Other researchers have urged caution, noting that this new analysis relies heavily on visual methods leaving open many questions which could be resolved with chemical analyses.
Yeah, the picture was upside down in the article too.
The abstract for Fossil coleoid cephalopod from the Mississippian Bear Gulch Lagerstätte sheds light on early vampyropod evolution is below and the full paper can be read by clicking the hyperlink provided.
Abstract
We describe an exceptionally well-preserved vampyropod, Syllipsimopodi bideni gen. et sp. nov., from the Carboniferous (Mississippian) Bear Gulch Lagerstätte of Montana, USA. The specimen possesses a gladius and ten robust arms bearing biserial rows of suckers; it is the only known vampyropod to retain the ancestral ten-arm condition. Syllipsimopodi is the oldest definitive vampyropod and crown coleoid, pushing back the fossil record of this group by ~81.9 million years, corroborating molecular clock estimates. Using a Bayesian tip-dated phylogeny of fossil neocoleoid cephalopods, we demonstrate that Syllipsimopodi is the earliest-diverging known vampyropod. This strongly challenges the common hypothesis that vampyropods descended from a Triassic phragmoteuthid belemnoid. As early as the Mississippian, vampyropods were evidently characterized by the loss of the chambered phragmocone and primordial rostrum—traits retained in belemnoids and many extant decabrachians. A pair of arms may have been elongated, which when combined with the long gladius and terminal fins, indicates that the morphology of the earliest vampyropods superficially resembled extant squids.
We describe an exceptionally well-preserved vampyropod, Syllipsimopodi bideni gen. et sp. nov., from the Carboniferous (Mississippian) Bear Gulch Lagerstätte of Montana, USA. The specimen possesses a gladius and ten robust arms bearing biserial rows of suckers; it is the only known vampyropod to retain the ancestral ten-arm condition. Syllipsimopodi is the oldest definitive vampyropod and crown coleoid, pushing back the fossil record of this group by ~81.9 million years, corroborating molecular clock estimates. Using a Bayesian tip-dated phylogeny of fossil neocoleoid cephalopods, we demonstrate that Syllipsimopodi is the earliest-diverging known vampyropod. This strongly challenges the common hypothesis that vampyropods descended from a Triassic phragmoteuthid belemnoid. As early as the Mississippian, vampyropods were evidently characterized by the loss of the chambered phragmocone and primordial rostrum—traits retained in belemnoids and many extant decabrachians. A pair of arms may have been elongated, which when combined with the long gladius and terminal fins, indicates that the morphology of the earliest vampyropods superficially resembled extant squids.
a Schematic drawing of Syllipsimopodi bideni gen. et sp. nov.; teal = gladius, orange = head (including arms), brown = buccal apparatus,
gray = ink sac, blue = conus, magenta = fin support, patterned yellow = scale-like patches (possible connective tissue remnant).
b Increased contrast false color image of Syllipsimopodi, holotype ROMIP 64897. Scale = 1 cm. c Artistic reconstruction showing suckers
gray = ink sac, blue = conus, magenta = fin support, patterned yellow = scale-like patches (possible connective tissue remnant).
b Increased contrast false color image of Syllipsimopodi, holotype ROMIP 64897. Scale = 1 cm. c Artistic reconstruction showing suckers
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