US EditionScottish Fossil Reveals 410-Million-Year-Old Life Form Unlike Anything on Earth
The fossil Prototaxites, towering up to 8 meters, represents a unique extinct eukaryotic lineage distinct from plants and fungi, resolving a 165-year debate, scientists said.
- A 410-million-year-old fossil from Scotland has been added to the collections of National Museums Scotland.
- Scientists believe the fossil, initially thought to be a fungus, represents a distinct extinct evolutionary branch of life.
- The fossil supports the theory that Prototaxites represents an independent experiment in building complex organisms.
- Researchers conclude that the morphology and molecular fingerprint of P. Taiti distinguishes it from fungi and other organisms preserved in the Devonian deposit.
32 Articles
32 Articles
For almost two centuries, the prototaxites intrigued science.These giant organisms were the first large life forms to dominate terrestrial environments, rising as smooth columns up to eight meters high in landscapes of the Devonic period, about 400 million years ago. Lacking branches, leaves, flowers or true roots, they challenged successive attempts at classification since their fossils began to be described in the mid-19th century.Now, an inve…
Giant Fossils in Scotland's Museum Reveal an Extinct Evolutionary Way of Life
A towering fossil from one of the most mysterious chapters in Earth's history has found a permanent home in Scotland. A 410-million-year-old Prototaxites fossil, discovered near the village of Rhynie in Aberdeenshire, has been added to the collections of National Museums Scotland (NMS), where it will be preserved and studied at the museum's collection centre in Edinburgh. At an estimated 8 metres (26 feet) high, Prototaxites would have dwarfed a…
For almost 200 years, giant fossils have bewildered science. They are the prototaxites, organisms that dominated the terrestrial environments of the Devonian period, about 400 million years ago, and that reached up to eight meters high, like huge columns without branches or leaves.A new scientific study now raises an unprecedented explanation.Prototaxites were not plants or fungi.Nor algae.The research proposes that they belonged to a completely…
Scientists may have discovered a new extinct form of life
Prototaxites are something of a prehistoric mystery. They were the first giant organisms on land, towering over ancient landscapes at heights of up to 8 meters. They had smooth trunk-like pillars and no branches, leaves or flowers. And unlike trees, they had no true root system. Instead, they may have been anchored to the ground by a simple bulbous base.
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