Fossils of an ancient sea creature are the oldest evidence of right-handedness
Researchers analyzed more than 100 fossils and found a 2-to-1 left-bending pattern that suggests the ancient animal could move and favored its right side.
- On Thursday, researchers published a study in Scientific Reports revealing that Spriggina fossils dating back about 550 million years demonstrate a distinct right-sided behavioral preference.
- Paleontologists long debated whether the creature's curved body resulted from environmental forces like currents or intentional movement, prompting researchers to examine more than 100 fossils.
- Lead author Scott Evans, an assistant curator at the American Museum of Natural History, found that twice as many fossils bent left, indicating rightward body curvature in life.
- Diego García-Bellido, a senior paleontology researcher at the South Australian Museum and associate professor at Adelaide University, noted this indicates Spriggina possessed a nervous system connected to muscles.
- While no animal alive today resembles Spriggina, the creature established an evolutionary foundation for directional preference, a trait now common in humans, primates, mice, frogs, and insects.
42 Articles
42 Articles
Ediacaran Sea Creature May Hold Earliest Evidence of Right-Handedness
Spriggina floundersi, a marine species that lived during the Ediacaran period 550 million years ago, is one of Earth’s earliest bilaterally symmetrical animals. The post Ediacaran Sea Creature May Hold Earliest Evidence of Right-Handedness appeared first on Sci.News: Breaking Science News.
World’s first right-hander could be this 550 million-year-old worm
As anyone who’s grown up favoring their southpaw can attest, the world overwhelmingly caters to right-handers. The vast majority of humans (somewhere around 85-90 percent) are right-handed, a tendency influenced by a combination of genes and environment. But it turns out this long-known preference towards the right may go back much further than scientists once thought—hundreds of millions of years further back, in fact. This preference toward th…
550-million-year-old fossil may reveal first-ever ‘right-handedness’ in the animal kingdom
Spriggina floundersi was no bigger than a few centimeters, lived on ancient seafloors in what is now South Australia, and lacked anything you would call a hand. Yet fossils of the creature now point to something surprisingly familiar: a consistent tendency to turn one way more than the other. That pattern, described in Scientific Reports, may be the oldest known evidence of population-wide handedness in the animal kingdom. The animal lived about…
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