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Mar 2, 2009 07:01 PM | 11
A 300 million-year-old fossilized fish brain was discovered during a routine computed tomography (CT) scan, according to a study published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Until now, scientists assumed that brains rarely—if ever—turned into fossils. Other soft tissue fossils, such as muscles and kidneys, have been found that date back longer than 350 million years ago, but because the brain is delicate and consists mostly of water, it's much less likely to be preserved in fossil form, says study co-author John Maisey, a curator in the paleontology division of the American Museum of Natural History in New York. But "It's more than just a curiosity," he says. "Modern technology has revealed a fossil that we really didn't know about before." High-powered scans using x-ray synchrotron microtomography (which, like a CT, uses x-rays to image cross-sections of an object) allowed scientists to peer into the rock-solid skull to see the 0.06-by-0.28-inch (1.5 by 7 mm) brain.
The fossil was from an iniopterygian, an ancient extinct fish that is a relative of sharks, rays and ratfish. What surprised researchers even further is that it showed a brain similar to that of modern-day shark.
In the fossilization process, the brain itself was replaced with hard minerals, which preserved the shape of the original organ, and the rest of the cavity was filled with sediment, Maisey says. He notes that researchers found several fossilized craniums, each resembling a little "broken bowl of rock," in rock from the Upper Carboniferous period in Kansas and Oklahoma. But only one has yielded a preserved brain structure.
"It's quite possible that brain fossils are actually more common, and we simply haven't been able to find them," says Maisey, who noted that researchers may now try to check out other fossilized skulls with the high-tech scanners to see if they contain mineralized brains. Of course, this finding also means that paleontologists may have to stretch their own brains a bit to include things other than bones. "Now we have to learn new things about brains," Maisey joked, "that we didn't have to bother with [before]."
Image of fossilized brain courtesy of A. Pradel
Tags:
fish,
fossils,
brain,
shark
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11 Comments
Add CommentIs it just me - or does anyone else see the irony in this?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisKansas - ground zero for creationism, location for oldest fossilized brain?
Almost enough to make one believe that SOMEONE has a sense of humor.
Bah. God put those fossils into the ground 6,000 years ago.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo that's where Kansas creationists left their brains... in the ground, three hundred million years ago.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have information that claims that Satan buried it in order to mislead you into believing in evolution.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisobviously some brains in Kansas have not evolved since 300 mya
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have a feeling that if GOD decides to punish anyone, it will be the ones who didn't use the brains he gave them. He will say "you decided to believe a stupid book, written by morrons, over all the scientific evidence I gave you, you shall burn in eternal flame for your idiocy, I will now be sending all the people who used the brains I gave them to heaven."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou wrote "morrons," I think you meant "Mormons."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt was immediately nominated to head the Department Health and Human Services (HHS).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisConfirmation by the full Senate is expected quickly with the endorsement of John McCain--the nominees Great Grant-Father.
cool!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI wonder what could be learned from such findings?
Yet another proof of "Darwin Rules!", (ok, I was to say something in the lines of Darwin Rules! #%"$ "inteligent" design, but I'm supposed to be mature enough to restrain myself from doing that)
Similar to modern day sharks, I knew this guys were "old timers", and hadn't had much change in 250 million years, but this is newer info to me.
That definitely teaches us that today's noise is tomorrow's measuring... if this skull had been found back in the 1800s, they would have used a geologist hammer or something else like that to study it, and the brain would have been wiped off the scientist's desk mistaken with sediments.
For a good lesson in spin go to http://www.icr.org/article/4553/
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI don't get these guys, i understand dogma never gets updated or changed. But science is about learning and change....
You don.t get it do you? The dating system itself is flawed. But you go ahead and believe in your religion. Yes evolution is the state religion as the state is the only place it gets money and support unlike the other option which is funded privately. And yes we found a TRex here in Montana with flesh on the bone. Millions of years my arse.
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