Australian scientists have uncovered wonderfully conserved fossilized hearts and other internal organs of ancient armoured fish, a discovery that gives information on the evolution of the bodies of vertebrates, including humans.
The researchers described the heart on Thursday in placoderm fish that existed on a tropical reef some 380 million years ago, during the Devonian Period. The heart pumps blood via the body’s circulatory system.
By 250 million years, the fossils predate all known fish hearts. The preserved liver, stomach, and intestine from these placoderms helped during a crucial point in the evolution of vertebrates, which include fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals.
The Gogo Formation, in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, not far from the town of Fitzroy Crossing, is where the fossils were found. They are exceptional because soft tissue is rarely preserved as a fossil, unlike hard items like bones and teeth, and even less usually preserved in clear three dimensions, like these are, as compared to flattened.
The site is without a doubt one of the most important fossil sites in the world for recognizing the early evolution of backboned animals, including the origins of the human body plan, according to vertebrate paleontologist Kate Trinajstic of Curtin University and the Western Australian Museum.
The newly identified fossils belonged to two species with the names Compagopiscis croucheri and Incisoscutum ritchiei. They both feature huge, blunt-nosed heads, and asymmetrical tail fins that mimic sharks, teeth, and cutting edges in their jaws. They are both around 10 inches (25 cm) long.
