Evidence Of Giant Sea Scorpions That Lived About 444 Million Years Ago Has Been Found In Australia, With Fossil Record Suggesting Environmental Shifts Caused Their Extinction
During the Paleozoic era, a group of giant sea scorpions lived approximately 444 million years ago.
Evidence of these massive creatures called eurypterids from the family Pterygotidae has been found in Australia. They vanished from the fossil record about 393 million years ago, suggesting that significant environmental shifts led to their extinction.
A team of researchers from the American Museum of Natural History, the Australian Museum Research Institute, and the WB Clarke Geoscience Center in Australia collaborated to find more traces of pterygotids in Australia.
Recent research has documented sea scorpions from China, but little evidence has been found in Australia.
They examined rock formations in New South Wales and discovered the presence of pterygotid eurypterids. They identified two new examples—one from the Silurian era, which spanned 443.8 to 419.2 million years ago—and the other from the Devonian era, which lasted from 419.2 to 358.9 million years ago.
The fossils that were unearthed consisted mostly of exoskeleton fragments. One specimen was identified as a Pterygotus, and the other was of a Jaekelopterus, the largest known sea scorpion species. Some were even larger than a human.
Latex casts of the fossils were made and coated in magnesium oxide. They were also photographed under different lighting conditions, such as low-angle LED lights.
They were almost identical to fossils that have been uncovered around the supercontinent Gondwana. The discoveries of their fossils in different regions suggest that the giant sea scorpions were able to cross the ocean and cover thousands of miles.
“That tells us that these animals were actually really built quite effectively for traveling really, really far. So, they were probably traversing a similar amount of distance as some whales do,” said Russell Bicknell, a paleobiologist with the American Museum of Natural History.
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The enormous size of the creatures may have played a role in their ability to travel such long distances, but it is also possible that the need to migrate influenced their gigantic size.
Although the giant sea scorpions dominated the area millions of years ago, they no longer exist today. They also disappeared very suddenly from the fossil record.
Scientists speculate that changes in climate and environmental conditions contributed to their extinction. However, the exact cause remains a mystery. Overall, the study has provided an excellent starting point for further research. The researchers plan to keep looking in the hopes of finding out why they died out.
“It allows us to understand the scope of this idea called gigantism—or things getting really, really big—and allows us to understand what gigantism as an evolutionary process can produce,” Bicknell said.
The examined specimens are now housed in the paleontological collection of the Australian Museum in Sydney.
The paper is published in the scientific journal Gondwana Research.
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