Search the Community

QUOTE: "In addition, at least one specimen of Palaeolenus lantenoisi shows the preservation of an unusual combination of digestive structures: a crop and paired digestive glands along the alimentary tract. This combination of digestive structures has also never been observed in trilobites this old, and is rare in general, with prior evidence of it from one juvenile trilobite specimen from the late Cambrian Orsten fauna of Sweden and possibly one adult trilobite specimen from the Early Ordovician Fezouata Lagerstätte. The presence and combination of these digestive features in the Guanshan trilobites contradicts current models of how the trilobite digestive system was structured and evolved over time." Hopkins, M.J., Chen, F., Hu, S., & Zhang, Z. (2017) The oldest known digestive system consisting of both paired digestive glands and a crop from exceptionally preserved trilobites of the Guanshan Biota (Early Cambrian, China). PLoS ONE 12(9)e0184982:1-14 OPEN ACCESS PDF SUPPLEMENTAL PDF

hey guys. ok... so the recent crash deleted my huge write up and everything everyone said in the thread. oh well, i guess ill just have to start out from scratch again! alright, so here is a complete mixosaurid ichthyosaur Mixosaurus panxianensis from the eastern border of Yunnan province, China. many mixosaurid ichthyosaurs have been discovered in the neighboring province, Guizhou. a site where this ichthyosaur wasn't found in is called Panxian, albeit it is 300 km away to the east from where this guy was discovered. i'm not sure if you can see it in the picture, but there is an interesting relationship going on with the jugal and the quadratojugal of this mixosaur. they lack external contact. I previously thought that this mixosaur was a Barracudasaurus maotaiensis, redescribed from Mixosaurus maotaiensis, but the mandible was a lot more broad than the mandibles seen in those of B. maotianensis. the eye sockets are oval and large, but not as big as barracudasaurs. i think you can also see the scapula in the right fore fin photo, but the coracoid is missing. it is very probable that the two unidentified bones beside the radius are broken pieces of the coracoid. the coracoid is not completely seen on the surface, as some broken pieces might still be buried in the matrix. although part of the tail vertebrae has been touched up, it is obvious that the remaining fossil mixosaur is authentic. rare in china's case! the mixosaur has been polished, excluding the main body. polished bones could be seen as paint like streaks. the mixosaur is 1.2 meters long. with the matrix and the holder, it would be around 1.5 meters. it takes up a lot of space to tell the truth enjoy!