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Scientists have found remains of fat in an ancient fossil belonging to the first confirmed animal.
The fat, discovered by researchers at the Australian National University, is 558 million years old and belonged to a strange creature called Dickinsonia.
Dickinsonia was 1.4 meters long and oval in shape with rib-shaped segments.
Its fossilized remains were found in a remote area near the White Sea in Russia.
Dr. Jochen Brocks, who led the study, said, "The fossil fat molecules we found prove that animals were large and abundant 558 million years ago, millions of years ago. years earlier than expected.
"Scientists have been fighting for more than 75 years on what Dickinsonia and other bizarre fossils of Edicaran biota were: single-cell giant amoebae, lichens, failed experiments in evolution, or early animals. on earth.
"The fossil fat now confirms Dickinsonia as the oldest known animal fossil, solving a decades-old mystery that has been the holy grail of paleontology."
Until now, researchers have struggled to find Dickinsonia fossils that retain organic matter.
Dr. Ilya Bobrovskiy, author of the study, said: "Most of the rocks containing these fossils, like those in the Ediacara Hills in Australia, have been subjected to a lot of heat, a lot of pressure and they have been damaged. rocks that paleontologists have studied for decades, which explains why they were stuck on the question of Dickinsonia's true identity.
To understand the age of the fossil, the researchers analyzed molecules inside.
Dr. Brocks said, "When Ilya showed me the results, I could not believe it. But I immediately saw the meaning. "
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