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400 million year old gives evolutionary clues Monash University October 19, 2006 A fossil fish discovered in the West Australian Kimberley has been identified as the missing clue in vertebrate evolution, rewriting a century-old theory on how the first land animals evolved.
The fossil skeleton shows the fish's skull had large holes for breathing through the top of the head but importantly also had muscular front fins with a well-formed humerus, ulna and radius - the same bones are found in the human arm. "This new fossil proves that features of land-living tetrapods (four-legged vertebrates) evolved much earlier in their evolutionary history than previously thought," Mr Fitzgerald, a researcher in the School of Geosciences, said. "This means that humans can trace their evolutionary roots, and adaptations for life on land, further back in time, to more than 380 million years ago. "This little fossil fish, Gogonasus, is therefore the ultimate 'Mother' of all tetrapods." The research findings are published today in the journal Nature. "Gogonasus is the new pivotal fossil for understanding the earliest phase in the transition from sea-going fish to land-dwelling tetrapods -- from dinosaurs, to kangaroos, and ultimately, us humans," Mr Fitzgerald said. "The fossils of Gogonasus raise the possibility that tetrapods originated not in the northern hemisphere, as is widely thought, but in Gondwana, the ancient southern super-continent, and more specifically Australia. But further discoveries of fossils in Australia are needed to confirm this." This is a modified news release from Monash University
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