Tiktaalik

Here I show a fossil as it travels from the field to the lab and is carefully prepared as specimen: the skeleton of the new animal. Photograph -- courtesy of Ted Daeschler, Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia

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Dinesh ^club

23 months ago. Edited 23 months ago.

Dinesh ^club

What we saw gradually emerge from these rocks during the fall of 2004 was beautiful intermediate between fish and land-living animals have almost crocodile-like heads -- flat, with the eyes on top. Fish do not have necks: their shoulders are attached to their heads by a series of bony plates. Every land-living animals, like all their descendants, do have necks, meaning their heads can bend independently of their shoulder.

There are other big differences. Fish have scales all over their bodies; land-living animals do not. Also, importantly, fish have fins, whereas land-living animals have limbs with fingers, toes, wrists, and ankles. We can continue these comparison and make a very long list of the way that fish differ from land-living animals

But our new creature broke down the distinction between these two different kinds of animal. Like a fish, it has scales on its back and fins with fin webbing. But like early land-living animals, it has a flat head and a neck. And, when we look inside the fin, we see bones that correspond to the upper arm, the forearm, even parts of the wrist. The joints are there, too: this is fish with shoulder, elbow, and wrist joints. All inside a fin with webbing ~ Pages 23/24

23 months ago. Edited 23 months ago.

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