This ancient tadpole fossil is the oldest ever discovered

Scientists person uncovered nan oldest-known fossil of a tadpole that wriggled astir 160 cardinal years ago

NEW YORK -- Scientists person discovered nan oldest-known fossil of a elephantine tadpole that wriggled astir complete 160 cardinal years ago.

The caller fossil, recovered successful Argentina, surpasses nan erstwhile ancient grounds holder by astir 20 cardinal years.

Imprinted successful a slab of sandstone are parts of nan tadpole's skull and backbone, on pinch impressions of its eyes and nerves.

“It's not only nan oldest tadpole known, but besides nan astir exquisitely preserved,” said study writer Mariana Chuliver, a biologist astatine Buenos Aires’ Maimonides University.

Researchers cognize frogs were hopping astir arsenic acold backmost arsenic 217 cardinal years ago. But precisely really and erstwhile they evolved to statesman arsenic tadpoles remains unclear.

This caller find adds immoderate clarity to that timeline. At astir a half ft (16 centimeters) long, nan tadpole is simply a younger type of an extinct elephantine frog.

“It's starting to thief constrictive nan timeframe successful which a frog becomes a frog,” said Ben Kligman, a paleontologist astatine nan Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History who was not progressive pinch nan research.

The results were published Wednesday successful nan diary Nature.

The fossil is strikingly akin to nan tadpoles of coming — moreover containing remnants of a gill scaffold strategy that modern-day tadpoles usage to sift nutrient particles from water.

That intends nan amphibians' endurance strategy has stayed tried and existent for millions of years, helping them outlast respective wide extinctions, Kligman said.

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