Oldest predator on Earth: fossil discovered

Researchers discovered a fossil related to oldest predator on earth. It is a primitive jellyfish Found 560 million years ago near Leicester, England. A city to which Sir David is very attached. This is the first of its kind with a skeleton.

The animal was seven centimeters long and had the distinction of being tied to the bottom of the sea with a beige “stalk”. With the help of the tentacles it caught food. the scientific name is Auroralumina attenboroughii. The first part of the name means “lantern of the dawn” because it resembles a burning torch.

When I was at school in Leicester I was an avid fossil hunter. The rocks in which Auroralumina has now been discovered were then considered so ancient that they dated back to long before life on the planet began.

Sir David

The ancient specimen appears to be related to the coral, jellyfish, and anemone family. The jellyfish has been nicknamed “small solitary fossil” by Dr. Dunn. Its origin is given by shallower waters than others, always near Leicester.

This is very different from other fossils in Charnwood Forest and around the world. Most other fossils from this period have extinct body plans and it is unclear how they are related to living animals. This is clearly skeletal, with tightly packed tentacles that would have swung in the water to catch passing food, much like corals and sea anemones do today. It looks like nothing else we found in the fossil record at the time. The ancient rocks of Charnwood closely resemble the rocks deposited deep in the ocean on the flanks of volcanic islands, as they do at the foot of Montserrat in today’s Caribbean.

Frankie Dunn, of the University of Oxford Natural History Museum