If you are a science fiction enthusiast, you must know Cthulhu myth . In the world of Cthulhu, the dark and Chaos Ancient God is the ruler of the universe, with millions of appearances, the most important feature of which is the tentacle of the order of geometric magnitude. Recently, scientists discovered a new ocean fossil, which actually has 45 tentacles ! But this tentacle monster is not a monster. It turns out to be the distant relative of sea cucumber ! Is this the "sea cucumbers become sperm" plan to exterminate humans...
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Produced by: Cryalex (Shanghai Science and Technology Education Press)
Produced by: Computer Network Information Center of Chinese Academy of Sciences
If you are a science fiction enthusiast, you must know the Cthulhu myth. Cthulhu Mythos is an overview myth system based on Howard Phillips Lovecraft's novel world and compiled the settings and ideas of Lovecraft and other authors by journalists and disciples of his contemporary era.
In the world of Cthulhu, the dark and chaotic ancient gods are the rulers of the universe, with millions of appearances, the most important feature of which is the tentacles of the order of geometric magnitude.
△Image of the ancient god of Cthulhu Picture source: VS Battles Wiki – Fandom
The newly discovered marine fossil records the evolution of paleontology
Recently, scientists discovered a new marine fossil. Based on it, it reconstructed the appearance characteristics of this ancient species, allowing us to see the real Cthulhu paleontology. Yes, it also has a rich number of tentacles: 45. The study was published in the April 2019.
△Paleobial restoration 3D image Source: Reference 1
The location of the fossil was discovered in Herefordshire, England. The Wales -England border rock formation is famous for its storage of a large number of marine invertebrates fossils, including coral , brachiopods, trilobites, daggers and foraminifera.
△Cheng coral specimen Source: Earth Sciences-Journal of China University of Geosciences March 2015
.4 billion years ago, the rock formation here was located in a medium-depth seabed (2000m), which was once a paradise for echinoderm (such as sea urchins, starfish, sea cucumbers, sea lilies). Scientists believe that when the disaster strikes, fine-grained volcanic ash mixed with carbonate mud quickly covered the seabed, buried the animals on the seabed alive, and preserved their soft tissue structure intact.
By studying these fossil materials, scientists can not only understand the paleoenvironment and paleogeography, but also understand the evolutionary history of paleoorganisms, such as how they undergo body morphological changes.
Hundreds of subtle fossils are only for restoration of marine paleogenes
Generally speaking, the information that fossils can preserve is very limited, so in many cases, paleogenes restored based on the scientific evidence found may not be true, because there is no soft tissue and can only be limited recovery through bones and muscles.
The 3 cm wide fossil found in the UK preserves unique and subtle features, allowing scientists to create digital representations of this ancient species.
To create a three-dimensional model of this tentacle creature, the research team combined computer reconstruction technology and imaging techniques commonly used in medical research for reconstruction.
First, they cut the ancient egg-shaped volcanic ash shell, which is a relatively easy step. It was impressive after opening, and the fossils inside were intact.
Then, in order to see the paleontology’s appearance before life and restore the composition of soft tissue, the researchers first reconstructed hundreds of its subtle feature maps.
△ 3D structural diagram of oral outer sheath source: Reference 1
From these subtle feature diagrams, it can be seen that the surface of the fossil is rough. In order to show more details, the research team carefully polished the fossil with sandpaper, and the thickness of each polishing is about one-three hundred millimeter.The details captured by each polish are equivalent to a small slice and then photographed at each stage, using this method to restore the size and shape of the fossil's internal features. The reconstructed image is called a virtual fossil. This arduous recovery process is time-consuming and boring, but it is the only way to study the internal characteristics of the fossil.
△Sollasina Cthulhu 3D reconstruction process Source: References 1
Research team listed its unique features based on these fossils and compared them with those found in other fossils and the same genus. Finally, the numbers restored the image of this ancient creature during his lifetime, with tentacles all over his body, a total of 45, just like the picture below:
△Sollasina cthulhu's final restored image Source: Reference 1
Of course, because it looks so much like the image of the ancient god in Robert M. Price's essay "H. P. Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos", the researchers named the newly discovered species: Sollasina cthulhu (cthulhu means Cthulhu).
"Ancient God of Cthulhu" is actually a sea cucumber? How to classify Cthulhu in
? Through further research, scientists found that Sollasina cthulhu also has an inner ring structure. Then, compared with the marine invertebrate characteristics on the evolutionary tree, the scientists determined the classification of new species and determined their location on the evolutionary timeline, and finally determined that Sollasina cthulhu was a distant relative of modern sea cucumbers and lived in Silurian .
It turns out that the dark and chaotic ancient god of Cthulhu is an edible sea cucumber!
What is the significance of discovering the "Ancient God of Cthulhu"?
This has to start with echinoderm. Take sea cucumber as an example. Although it looks super ugly, its survival history is amazingly long. It appeared earlier than primitive fish. It began to appear in the Precambrian period more than 600 million years ago, and is known as living fossils of the ocean.
△A bunch of sea cucumbers Source: Wikipedia
△Echindermal animal Atlas Source: Literature 1
Sea cucumber bone fragments are endoskeletons located on the surface of sea cucumber dermis. They are an important classification feature of sea cucumbers, but how it has such an endoskeleton is still unknown, because there are no branches on the evolutionary tree, and the reason for not being there is very simple, that is, the relevant fossils cannot be found. Therefore, there is insufficient evidence to determine the evolutionary relationship between sea cucumber species from a morphological perspective.
△Bone pieces of sea cucumber Picture source: Wikipedia
Some scientists speculate that the type of sea cucumber bone pieces from simple to complex is an evolutionary process, while some scientists hold the opposite view, believing that the evolution of bone pieces is a process from complex to simple.
Thanks to scientists' discovery of Sollasina cthulhu's fossils, it can be seen that there are also large pieces of bone fragments in the fossils, which shows that the endoskeleton of sea cucumber is a kind of degeneration, and it is likely to have degenerated into tiny bone fragments in hundreds of millions of years. Scientists also confirmed that the retractable small tentacles of sea cucumber are also very long. It is speculated that Sollasina cthulhu's tentacles are used to crawl and can also capture food from the seabed.
References:
Rahman Imran A., Thompson Jeffrey R., Briggs Derek E. G., Siveter David J., Siveter Derek J., and Sutton Mark D. A new ophiocitioid with soft-tissue preservation from the Silurian Herefordshire Lagerstätte, and the evolution of the holothurian body plan286Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
http://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2018.2792
