"Cactus ambulante", lost link of the arthropods

2011/04/01 Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Eboluzioa
• Zoologia
• Paleontologia
• Arkeologia

A fossil discovered in southwest China has allowed a step forward in understanding the evolution of arthropods. The name of Diania cactiformis, and the nickname "cactus", has been put by the team of paleontologists who have discovered (from the Freie University of Berlin) and explained that the discovery has served to confirm that the arthropods come from the wolves.

It is, precisely, an animal of the Lobopodia group, that is, a group of animals similar to those of black kicks (most of them expired). The itinerant cactus, which lived 500 million years ago, had an approximate length of six centimeters and, like the rest of the lobopodiums, had a soft body. Unlike the rest of the known lobopods, however, it had articulated legs (such as arthropods). And that's what scientists have highlighted. In fact, they have believed that arthropods came from lobodiodes for a long time, but so far they did not find animals with articulated legs in this group.