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A 319-million-year-old brain has been discovered. It could be the oldest of its kind
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A scan of the skull of a 319-million-year-old fossilized fish has led to the discovery of the oldest example of a well-preserved vertebrate brain, shining a new light on the early evolution of bony fish.
The fossil of the skull belonging to the extinct Coccocephalus wildi was found in a coal mine in England more than a century ago, according to researchers of the study published in the journal Nature on Wednesday.
The fossil is the only known specimen of the fish species so scientists from the University of Michigan in the US and the University of Birmingham in the UK used the nondestructive imaging technique of computed tomography (CT) scanning to look inside its skull and examine its internal bodily structure.
Upon doing so, came a surprise. The CT image showed an “unidentified blob,” a University of Michigan press release said.
The distinct, 3D object had a clearly defined structure with features found in vertebrate brains: It was bilaterally symmetrical, contained hollow spaces similar in appearance to ventricles and had extending filaments that resembled cranial nerves.
“This is such an exciting and unanticipated find,” study coauthor Sam Giles, a vertebrate paleontologist and senior research fellow at the University of Birmingham, told CNN Thursday, adding that they had “no idea” there was a brain inside when they decided to study the skull.
“It was so unexpected that it took us a while to be certain that it actually was a brain. Aside from being just a preservational curiosity, the anatomy of the brain in this fossil has big implications for our understanding of brain evolution in fishes,” she added.
C. wildi was an early ray-finned fish – possessing a backbone and fins supported by bony rods called “rays” – that is thought to have been 6 to 8 inches long, swum in an estuary, and ate small aquatic animals and aquatic insects, according to the researchers.
The brains of living ray-finned fish display structural features not seen in other vertebrates, most notably a forebrain consisting of neural tissue that folds outward, according to the study. In other vertebrates, this neural tissue folds inward.
C. wildi lacks this hallmark feature of ray-finned fish, with the configuration of a part of its forebrain called the “telencephalon” more closely resembling that of other vertebrates, such as amphibians, birds, reptiles and mammals, according to the study authors.
“This indicates that the telencephalon configuration seen in living ray-finned fishes must have emerged much later than previously thought,” lead study author Rodrigo Tinoco Figueroa, a doctoral student at the University of Michigan’s Museum of Paleontology, said.
He added that “our knowledge on the evolution of the vertebrate brain is mostly restricted to what we know from living species,” but “this fossil helps us fill important gaps in the knowledge, that could only be obtained from exceptional fossils like this.”
Unlike hard bones and teeth, scientists rarely find brain tissue – which is soft – preserved in vertebrate fossils, according to the researchers.
However, the study noted that C. wildi’s brain was “exceptionally” well preserved. While there are invertebrate brains up to 500 million years old that have been found, they are all flattened, said Giles, who added that this vertebrate brain is “the oldest three-dimensional fossil brain of anything we know.”
The skull was found in layers of soapstone. Low oxygen concentration, rapid burial by fine-grained sediment, and a very compact and protective braincase played key roles in preserving the brain of the fish, according to Figueroa.
The braincase created a chemical micro-environment around the enclosed brain that could have helped to replace its soft tissue with dense mineral that maintained the fine details of the brain’s 3D structures.
Giles said: “The next steps are to figure out exactly how such delicate features as the brain can be preserved for hundreds of millions of years, and look for more fossils that also preserve the brain.”
Neanderthals hunted and butchered giant elephants
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Some 125,000 years ago, enormous elephants that weighed as much as eight cars each roamed in what’s now northern Europe.
Scientifically known as Palaeoloxodon antiquus, the towering animals were the largest land mammals of the Pleistocene, standing more than 13 feet (4 meters) high. Despite this imposing size, the now-extinct straight-tusked elephants were routinely hunted and systematically butchered for their meat by Neanderthals, according to a new study of the remains of 70 of the animals found at a site in central Germany known as Neumark-Nord, near the city of Halle.
The discovery is shaking up what we know about how the extinct hominins, who existed for more than 300,000 years before disappearing about 40,000 years ago, organized their lives. Neanderthals were extremely skilled hunters, knew how to preserve meat and lived a more settled existence in groups that were larger than many scholars had envisaged, the research has suggested.
A distinct pattern of repetitive cut marks on the surface of the well-preserved bones — the same position on different animals and on the left and right skeletal parts of an individual animal — revealed that the giant elephants were dismembered for their meat, fat and brains after death, following a more or less standard procedure over a period of about 2,000 years. Given a single adult male animal weighed 13 metric tons (twice as much as an African elephant), the butchering process likely involved a large number of people and took days to complete.
Stone tools have been found in northern Europe with other straight-tusked elephant remains that had some cut marks. However, scientists have never had clarity on whether early humans actively hunted elephants or scavenged meat from those that died of natural causes. The sheer number of elephant bones with the systematic pattern of cut marks put this debate to rest, said the authors of the study published Wednesday in the journal Science Advances.
The Neanderthals likely used thrusting and throwing spears, which have been found at another site in Germany, to target male elephants because of their larger size and solitary behavior, said study coauthor Wil Roebroeks, a professor of Paleolithic archaeology at Leiden University in Germany. The demographics of the site skewed toward older and male elephants than would be expected had the animals died naturally, according to the study.
“It’s a matter of immobilizing these animals or driving them into muddy shores so that their weight works against them,” he said. “If you can immobilize one with a few people and corner them into an area where they get stuck. It’s a matter of finishing them off.”
What was most startling about the discovery was not that Neanderthals were capable of hunting such large animals but that they knew what to do with the meat, said Britt M. Starkovich, a researcher at the Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment at the University of Tübingen in Germany, in commentary published alongside the study.
“The yield is mindboggling: more than 2,500 daily portions of 4,000 calories per portion. A group of 25 foragers could thus eat a straight-tusked elephant for 3 months, 100 foragers could eat for a month, and 350 people could eat for a week,” wrote Starkovich, who was not involved in the research.
“Neanderthals knew what they were doing. They knew which kinds of individuals to hunt, where to find them, and how to execute the attack. Critically, they knew what to expect with a massive butchery effort and an even larger meat return.”
The Neanderthals living there likely knew how to preserve and store meat, perhaps through the use of fire and smoke, Roebroeks said. It’s also possible that such a meat bonanza was an opportunity for temporary gatherings of people from a larger social network, said study coauthor Sabine Gaudzinski-Windheuser, a professor of prehistoric and protohistoric archaeology at the Johannes Gutenberg-University in Mainz, Germany.
She explained the occasion could perhaps have served as a marriage market. An October 2022 study based on ancient DNA from a small group of Neanderthals living in what’s now Siberia suggested that women married outside their own community, noted Gaudzinski-Windheuser, who is also director of the Monrepos Archaeological Research Centre and Museum of Human Behavioural Evolution in Neuwied.
“We don’t see that in the archaeological record but I think the real benefit of this study is that now everything’s on the table,” she said.
Scientists had long thought that Neanderthals were highly mobile and lived in small groups of 20 or less. However, this latest finding suggested that they may have lived in much bigger groups and been more sedentary at this particular place and time, when food was plentiful and the climate benign. The climate at the time — before the ice sheets advanced at the start of the last ice age around 100,000 to 25,000 years ago — would have been similar to today’s conditions.
Killing a tusked elephant would not have been an everyday event, the study found, with approximately one animal killed every five to six years at this location based on the number found. It’s possible, however, that more elephant remains were destroyed as the site is part of a open cast mine, according to the researchers. Other finds at the site suggested Neanderthals hunted a wide array of animals across a lake landscape populated by wild horses, fallow deer and red deer.
More broadly, the study underscores the fact that Neanderthals weren’t brutish cave dwellers so often depicted in popular culture. In fact, the opposite is true: They were skilled hunters, understood how to process and preserve food, and thrived in a variety of different ecosystems and climates. Neanderthals also made sophisticated tools, yarn and art, and they buried their dead with care.
“To the more recognizably human traits that we know Neanderthals had — taking care of the sick, burying their dead, and occasional symbolic representation — we now also need to consider that they had preservation technologies to store food and were occasionally semi sedentary or that they sometimes operated in groups larger than we ever imagined,” Starkovich said.
Dallas Zoo says tamarin monkeys that went missing for a day are healthy and uninjured
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The emperor tamarin monkeys that disappeared from the Dallas Zoo earlier this week but were recovered by police in an abandoned home on Tuesday are healthy and uninjured, the zoo said.
“Emperor tamarin monkeys, Bella and Finn, were so happy to snuggle into their nest sack here at the Zoo last night!” the zoo said on Facebook. “Our veterinary and animal care teams have said, beyond losing a bit of weight, they show no signs of injury and both started eating and drinking almost immediately once the team completed health exams on Tuesday night.”
The zoo said the monkeys will go through a quarantine period before being returned to their zoo habitat.
The zoo also noted that video from their surveillance cameras released on Tuesday “seems to have been critical in generating a tip that led to the recovery of the tamarins.” Further, there is a $25,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and indictment of the person responsible, the zoo said.
The health update comes two days after the zoo said that two tamarin monkeys were missing and that their habitat had been “intentionally compromised.” The Dallas Police said they had reason to believe the monkeys were taken, the zoo said.
The disappearance followed a series of suspicious incidents at the zoo in the last month involving a leopard, langur monkeys and a vulture, all of which have led to a hike in security.
After a tip, the missing tamarin monkeys were found Tuesday inside a closet in an abandoned home in Lancaster, about 15 miles away from the zoo. The police released a photo of one monkey in the closet, standing atop what looked like fencing.
“We are thrilled beyond belief to share that our two emperor tamarin monkeys have been found,” the Dallas Zoo said Tuesday evening. “They will be evaluated by our veterinarians this evening.”
Elsewhere, a Louisiana zoo reported the weekend theft of 12 squirrel monkeys.
The Dallas Zoo learned Monday the duo of emperor tamarin monkeys was missing from their enclosure, it said.
Dallas police concluded the monkeys’ habitat was intentionally cut open, and it was “believed the animals were intentionally taken from the enclosure,” they said.
The zoo was closed Monday due to inclement weather, it earlier had announced, with the closure extended through Wednesday due to an ice storm.
How the animals left the zoo and got the abandoned house in Lancaster is still a mystery.
Police on Tuesday released surveillance video and a photo of an unidentified man they said they were searching for and want to interview. Police have not said why they want to speak to him or when the footage was recorded, and they’ve asked the public to contact them at 214-671-4509 with any information.
The surveillance video shows a man walking slowly down a nearly empty zoo sidewalk, looking back and forth as he moves. Another person is seen in the background walking in the opposite direction.
The photo shows a man wearing a navy hooded sweatshirt and a navy and red beanie cap while eating a bag of Doritos.
Zoo officials said Wednesday that security is being tightened.
“Although our security program had worked in the past, it has become obvious that we need to make significant changes,” officials said in a written statement. “Words cannot express the frustration our team is feeling.”
Security upgrades include more cameras and more than doubling the number of security patrols as well as increasing the number of people working overnight, installing more fencing and adding other unspecified security technology, according to the news release.
A few other strange developments with animals have unfolded in recent weeks at the Dallas Zoo.
A clouded leopard named Nova disappeared January 13, and the zoo closed to search for the animal.
Police launched a criminal investigation after they found the fence around Nova’s enclosure had been “intentionally cut,” they said. Later that day, Nova was found near her habitat.
Meanwhile, zoo staff observed a similar cut to the enclosure of some langur monkeys, but none of them had escaped, the zoo said.
Police did not immediately determine whether the two incidents were related.
The incidents prompted the zoo to ramp up security, including installing more cameras and boosting overnight security personnel and staffing, its president and CEO Gregg Hudson said. Restrictions were also placed on animals’ ability to go outside overnight, he added.
Then, a lappet-faced vulture named Pin was found dead January 21 in his habitat. “Circumstances of the death are unusual, and the death does not appear to be from natural causes,” the zoo said in a statement.
The bird’s death was “suspicious” and it suffered “an unusual wound and injuries,” Hudson said.
The zoo is offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and indictment of a suspect in the vulture’s death.
While the incidents at the Dallas Zoo and the monkey thefts at Zoosiana in Broussard, Louisiana, have raised general security concerns, at least one zoo in Florida is not stepping up security.
There are “several security measures already in place in Zoo Miami” and only so much that can be done, said Ron Magill, wildlife expert and Zoo Miami spokesperson.
“If someone wants to get in and is determined,” he told CNN, “they’re going to find a way.”
Dallas Zoo says its missing tamarin monkeys have been found
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Two emperor tamarin monkeys missing from the Dallas Zoo were found Tuesday, the zoo said.
“We are thrilled beyond belief to share that our two emperor tamarin monkeys have been found,” the zoo said in a statement.
Dallas police located the animals early Tuesday evening, the zoo said, without immediately releasing details about how they were found. The zoo earlier said the animals were believed to have been stolen Monday.
Police “called our team to come secure and transport the tamarins back to the Zoo,” the zoo said. The monkeys will be evaluated by veterinarians Tuesday evening, according to the zoo.
Dallas police earlier said its preliminary investigation found the emperor tamarin monkeys’ habitat had been intentionally cut open and “it is believed the animals were intentionally taken from the enclosure.”
Police had also released surveillance video and a photo of an unidentified man they wanted to speak to in regard to the two missing tamarin monkeys. “Dallas police are looking for the public’s help in identifying the pictured individual,” they wrote.
In the surveillance video, the man can be seen walking slowly down a nearly empty zoo sidewalk, looking back and forth as he moves. A second person also can be seen in the background, but that person walks in the opposite direction.
In the still image, the man is wearing a navy blue hooded sweatshirt and a navy and red beanie cap and is eating a bag of Doritos.
The investigation comes after a series of suspicious animal incidents this month at the Dallas Zoo. The zoo said it believed two of its emperor tamarin monkeys were stolen after they were discovered missing from their enclosure Monday.
“Emperor tamarin monkeys would likely stay close to home – the Zoo searched near their habitat and across Zoo grounds and did not locate them,” the zoo said in a statement Monday.
Earlier Monday, the zoo said it would be closed for the day due to inclement weather. The closure was later extended through Wednesday due to an ice storm impacting the area, the zoo said.
This is the fourth time this month that the zoo has discovered its animals or their enclosures may have been tampered with, including the “unusual” circumstances surrounding the death of a vulture last week, according to the zoo.
The string of events began January 13 when a clouded leopard named Nova disappeared, prompting the zoo to close as they searched for the animal. Dallas police opened a criminal investigation after it was discovered that the fence around Nova’s enclosure had been “intentionally cut,” police said.
While the feline was found close to her habitat later that day, zoo personnel also found a similar cut had been made to the enclosure of some langur monkeys. Despite the new escape route, none of the monkeys left their habitat, the zoo said. Police said at the time that it was “unknown if the two incidents are related.”
Following the incidents, the zoo installed additional security cameras, more than doubled its overnight security personnel, increased its overnight staffing, and began limiting some animals’ ability to go outside overnight, President and CEO Gregg Hudson said.
But less than two weeks after the first discoveries, a vulture named Pin was found dead in his habitat. Hudson called the bird’s death “suspicious” and said “an unusual wound and injuries” indicated Pin did not die from natural causes.
The zoo is offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and indictment of a suspect in the vulture’s death.
Dallas police are investigating all four incidents. A spokesperson said last week that the department is collaborating with US Fish and Wildlife on the investigations.
Hypertension Drug Shown to Extend Lifespan And Slow Aging in Animals : ScienceAlert
The hypertension drug rilmenidine has been shown to slow down aging in worms, an effect that in humans could hypothetically help us live longer and keep us healthier in our latter years.
Rilmenidine was picked for this latest study because past research has shown it mimics the effects of caloric restriction on a cellular level. Reducing available energy while maintaining nutrition within the body has been shown to extend lifespans in several animal models.
Whether this translates to human biology, or is a potential risk to our health, is a topic of ongoing debate. Finding ways to achieve the same benefits without the costs of extreme calorie cutting could lead to new ways to improve health in old age.
In a series of tests conducted by an international team of researchers, young and old Caenorhabditis elegans worms treated with the drug – which is normally used to treat high blood pressure – lived longer and presented higher measures in a variety of health markers in the same way as restricting calories, as the scientists had hoped.
“For the first time, we have been able to show in animals that rilmenidine can increase lifespan,” says molecular biogerontologist João Pedro Magalhães, from the University of Birmingham in the UK. “We are now keen to explore if rilmenidine may have other clinical applications.”
The C. elegans worm is a favorite for studies, because many of its genes have similarities to counterparts in our genome. Yet in spite of these similarities, it is still a rather distant relation to humans.
Further tests showed that gene activity associated with caloric restriction could be seen in the kidney and liver tissues of mice treated with rilmenidine. In other words, some of the changes that caloric restriction gives in animals and thought to confer certain health benefits also appear with a hypertension drug that many people already take.
Another discovery was that a biological signaling receptor called nish-1 was crucial in the effectiveness of rilmenidine. This particular chemical structure could be targeted in future attempts to improve lifespan and slow down aging.
“We found that the lifespan-extending effects of rilmenidine were abolished when nish-1 was deleted,” write the researchers in their published paper. “Critically, rescuing the nish-1 receptor reinstated the increase in lifespan upon treatment with rilmenidine.”
Low-calorie diets are hard to follow and come with a variety of side effects, such as hair thinning, dizziness, and brittle bones. It’s early days still, but the thinking is that this hypertension drug could confer the same benefits as a low-calorie diet while being easier on the body.
What makes rilmenidine a promising candidate as an anti-aging drug is that it can be taken orally, it’s already widely prescribed, and its side effects are rare and relatively mild (they include palpitations, insomnia and drowsiness in a few cases).
There’s a long way to go yet in figuring out if rilmenidine would work as an anti-aging drug for actual humans, but the early signs in these worm and mice tests are promising. We now know much more about what rilmenidine can do, and how it operates.
“With a global aging population, the benefits of delaying aging, even if slightly, are immense,” says Magalhães.
The research has been published in Aging Cell.
Cat-size primate relatives lived in the Arctic 52 million years ago
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Analysis of fossils found in the far north of Canada has revealed that two previously unknown species of ancient near-primates lived above the Arctic Circle some 52 million years ago, according to new research.
The now-extinct creatures belonged to a part of the primate family tree that branched off before the ancestors of lemurs diverged from the common ancestors of monkeys, apes and humans, said study coauthor Dr. Chris Beard, a distinguished foundation professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Kansas and senior curator at the university’s Biodiversity Institute and Natural History Museum.
The two sister species lived on what is now Ellesmere Island in northern Canada. They are the first known primatomorphans, or primate relatives, to have lived in latitudes north of the Arctic Circle, according to a study published Wednesday in the journal PLOS ONE.
The two species have been named Ignacius mckennai and Ignacius dawsonae.
“To get an idea of what Ignacius looked like, imagine a cross between a lemur and a squirrel that was about half the size of a domestic cat,” Beard said. “Unlike living primates, Ignacius had eyes on the sides of its head (instead of facing forward like ours) and it had claws on its fingers and toes instead of nails.”
When researchers analyzed the fossil fragments, the jawbones and teeth of Ignacius seemed different from other primatomorphans that lived in North America’s more southerly reaches.
“What I’ve been doing the past couple of years is trying to understand what they were eating, and if they were eating different materials than their middle-latitude counterparts,” said lead study author Kristen Miller, a doctoral student at the University of Kansas’ Biodiversity Institute and Natural History Museum.
The Arctic primatomorphans evolved special features in their jaws and teeth to chomp on harder foods, like nuts and seeds, as opposed to their preferred diet of ripe fruit. This physical adaptation was likely because for half of the year, the species lived in the darkness of Arctic winter, when food was much more difficult to find.
“That, we think, is probably the biggest physical challenge of the ancient environment for these animals,” Beard said.
These findings could also be used to understand how animals adapt and evolve amid periods of climate change — as with species facing the human-driven climate crisis today.
Researchers believe the primatomorphans descended from an ancestor species that trekked north from the more southerly regions of North America. Similar fossils have been found across Wyoming, Texas, Montana and Colorado, according to Miller.
“No primate relative has ever been found at such extreme latitudes,” Miller said. “They’re more usually found around the equator in tropical regions. I was able to do a phylogenetic analysis, which helped me understand how the fossils from Ellesmere Island are related to species found in midlatitudes of North America.”
The common ancestor of the two Ignacius species likely reached Ellesmere Island around 51 million years ago, Beard said. At the time, it was a peninsula jutting into the Arctic Sea from adjacent parts of North America.
Ignacius mckennai and Ignacius dawsonae are named in part after two of Beard’s former colleagues and mentors, he explained: the late paleontologists Dr. Mary Dawson of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh and Dr. Malcolm McKenna of the American Museum of Natural History in New York, both of whom worked extensively on Ellesmere Island.
During these ancient times, the Arctic Circle was a warmer, more hospitable place for life. Global warming had caused the region to be much warmer and wetter, with a swamplike environment. The warmer temperatures during this period likely encouraged Igancius’ ancestor to venture north.
“Winter temperatures may have gotten as low as freezing for short periods of time, but we know that there were hardly ever any sustained freezing temperatures because crocodilians have been found on Ellesmere Island, and they cannot survive long freezes,” Beard said. “In the summertime, temperatures reached about 70 degrees Fahrenheit.”
Despite the warmer temperatures, the primatomorphans still had to adapt to survive in their unique northern ecosystem. They grew bigger than their southern relatives, who resembled squirrels; such growth commonly happens in mammals living in northern latitudes because it helps them maintain the needed core body temperature, Beard said.
“(The findings) tells us to expect dramatic and dynamic changes to the Arctic ecosystem as it transforms in the face of continued warming,” Beard said. “Some animals that don’t currently live in the Arctic will colonize that region, and some of them will adapt to their new environment in ways that parallel Ignacius. Likewise, we can expect some of the new colonists to diversify in the Arctic, just as Ignacius did.”
Trilobites armed with tridents could be the earliest known example of sexual combat
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From a deer’s elaborate branching antlers to the fiddler crab’s oversize claw, the animal kingdom is full of flashy features used in combat to help secure a mate.
A team of researchers announced last week that it has found the earliest known evidence of sexual combat in the form of a trident-headed trilobite that scuttled the seafloor 400 million years ago.
Trilobites were one of the earliest arthropods, the group of invertebrates containing insects, spiders, lobsters, crabs and other organisms with exoskeletons, segmented bodies and jointed limbs. These pill bug-like sea creatures first emerged 521 million years ago and died out 252 million years ago in the mass extinction that gave way to the dinosaurs.
There were over 22,000 species of trilobite, some reaching lengths of more than 2 feet, but the type that caught the eye of paleontologist Alan Gishlick was more modest in size, around 2 to 3 inches. He recalls seeing specimens of Walliserops at fossil trade shows and marveling at the trident-shaped protrusion branching off the trilobites’ heads.
“That’s the type of structure that has to have a function. You don’t put that much biological energy into something that doesn’t do something,” said Gishlick, an associate professor of paleontology at Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania.
Researchers have proposed various uses for these forking protrusions, including defense, hunting and attracting mates.
In a paper published January 17 in the scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Gishlick and coauthor Richard Fortey delved into these hypotheses, ruling out the trident as a means of defense or a hunting tool based on how the trilobite would have been able to move it. The trident wouldn’t be of much use against predators attacking from above or behind, and while it could have been used to spear prey, the trilobite would then be stuck with its meal just out of reach.
What made the most sense to Gishlick and Fortey, a paleontologist at the Natural History Museum in London, was that Walliserops used the trident to fight among each other.
Their thinking was bolstered by an unusual specimen of Walliserops with a deformed trident bearing four prongs instead of the usual three. If the trident was a vital part of day-to-day survival, they reasoned, then the trilobite probably wouldn’t have lasted for long with a malformed one.
Bolstered with the evidence for Walliserops’ trident being used to win mates, the researchers turned to the closest analogue they could find in the modern world. “The structure reminds me a heck of a lot of beetle horns,” Gishlick said.
The researchers used a technique called landmark-based geometric morphometrics, which Gishlick described as a means of comparing complex shapes in a statistically robust way, to analyze the surface-level similarity of trilobite tridents and horns of rhinoceros beetles. They found that the trilobite tridents’ shape had a lot in common with the horns of beetles that flip their dueling partners in a “shoveling” motion, as opposed to other species whose horns are better for fencing or grasping.
Gishlick said he believes that, like in beetles, trilobites’ tridents were “sexual weapons” used by males sparring to win mates. “This is the earliest known structure that we can point to and say, ‘Yeah, I’m pretty sure that this is an animal weapon used in reproductive competition,’ ” he said.
Furthermore, Gishlick explained: “Generally, organisms that are involved in interspecific combat over mates are highly dimorphic” — varying in appearance from one sex to the other — “because only one does the competition, and generally in the animal world that’s the male.”
Growing features such as big combat-ready horns requires a lot of energy, and female animals already have to expend lots of it to produce eggs.
If the trilobites’ tridents are the first evidence of sexual weapons, then they could also be the earliest known evidence of sexual dimorphism. There’s one problem with this hypothesis, however: Scientists have no definitive means of telling which Walliserops are male and which are female, and no trident-less Walliserops have been discovered.
That might be due to bias by fossil collectors, who Gishlick said often prioritize bigger, flashier specimens, or because the females might be labeled as entirely different species. “This to me makes it very clear that you better be looking for females,” Gishlick said.
Erin McCullough, an assistant professor of biology at Clark University in Massachusetts, said she agrees with the researchers’ conclusion that the trilobite tridents were likely used for interspecies combat. However, she’s not sold on their argument that this was a trait only possessed by males.
“In general, if there’s going to be an extravagant trait that’s used for fighting for mates, usually, it’s the males that have the extravagant trait, but biology is fun because there’s always exceptions — female reindeer have antlers,” said McCullough, who was not involved with the study (but whose beetle analyses Gishlick and Fortey drew upon for their work).
“If they are arguing that these are male weapons that are used to gain access to females, it would have been a stronger story to me if they had evidence that the females don’t have weapons.”
Chinese zodiac fortune predictions for 2023
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Say goodbye to the Tiger; it’s time to hop into the Year of the Rabbit.
For many people, Lunar New Year, which falls on January 22 this year, is a time to consult the stars to find out what lies ahead in the coming months.
Most people know the basics: The 12-year Chinese zodiac calendar cycle is represented by 12 different animals – the Chinese zodiac signs. Your zodiac animal is determined by your year of birth.
But that’s only the start. For faithful followers of the system, a year isn’t just categorized by its animal. There’s also a complex sexagenary cycle made up of 10 heavenly stems and 12 earthly branches.
Every year, a heavenly stem (one of five elements, which fall into the yin or yang category) is paired with an earthly branch (one of the 12 Chinese zodiac animals).
Gui Mao is the 40th element of the Chinese sexagenary cycle – the Heavenly Stem “Gui” represents water, whereas the earthly branch “Mao” represents Rabbit. That makes 2023 the Year of the Water Rabbit.
“Gui Mao Rabbit Year is quite a special year – when all the elements in a year are yin,” says Thierry Chow, a Hong Kong-based geomancy consultant known for blending traditional Chinese geomancy with modern design elements.
“It’s also uncommon to have the combination of water and rabbit. The rabbit represents wood. Water nurtures wood (according to Chinese geomancy).”
She says industries with wood as their main element – like culture, publishing, agriculture and furniture – would benefit. Fire industries, on the other hand, including digital and technology businesses, may suffer as fire is afraid of Water.
“The Year of Water Rabbit is going to be a gentler year. We’ll have time to take a breather. We’ve been in the tunnel for the last few years, and the light is getting bigger now,” says Chow.
Followers believe that for each Chinese zodiac sign, luck will depend largely on the positions of the Tai Sui – the stellar deities thought to rotate parallel to and in the opposite direction of Jupiter.
To calculate how each person will be affected in a particular year, a Chinese geomancy consultant will look at one’s birth chart, which is composed of a wide range of elements – such as the day and time of their birth – to see how they may interact with the year’s elements.
These combinations play an important role for those who follow them, helping them make huge life decisions for the year ahead, such as whether they should get married or start a business.
Different geomancy masters may interpret the data differently. Still, there is a general consensus on what the year means for each zodiac animal based on the positions of the stars, especially Tai Sui.
– Source:
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Longevity noodles: the lucky Lunar New Year dish
If your zodiac sign clashes with Tai Sui – aka the Grand Duke of Jupiter – in a particular year, the experts say you might find yourself dealing with disruptions.
For those who may be in conflict with Tai Sui this year, Chow says they should remember the calendar is a rotating cycle.
“It’s like playing musical chairs – whoever sits in the spot gets Tai Sui. You’ll change your position next round,” says Chow, whose zodiac sign will also be in an unfavorable position with Tai Sui this year.
To resolve clashes, one could go to a Chinese temple and make offerings to representations of Tai Sui.
“Even if you don’t believe in it 100%, I feel like it gives you a nice kickstart to the year psychologically,” says Chow. “When things happen along the way, you’ll remember you did that, and it will give you a little cushion.”
Now, it’s time to get specific.
To determine what the Year of the Rabbit could mean for you, find your year of birth and the corresponding animal in the above gallery before reading Chow’s predictions below.
People born in the Year of the Rabbit will be facing their “Ben Ming Nian” – their own zodiac year – in 2023. Followers believe there will be more disruptions and instabilities in the year to come as a result.
“People born in the Rabbit year have to expect big changes health-wise, career-wise and relationship-wise. It could be a bit nerve-wracking, especially for those whose birth charts don’t favor Water,” says Chow.
“But do remember it never is all bad. It may mean an opportunity to grow.”
Rabbits should try to attract positive energy and join happy events when possible.
They should also travel to destinations to their south – doesn’t matter if these southern destinations are within their city or outside their country – says Chow.
It’s set to be a pretty good year for Dragons out there. No unlucky stars are affecting their year.
“There are no outstanding concerns, except maybe health for those born in the summer and autumn. They could easily feel stressed,” says Chow.
But the geomancy expert urges Dragons not to make rash decisions at work.
“It doesn’t mean overthinking. Just let things sit longer before you make a decision,” says Chow.
Single Dragons could meet potential romantic partners this year. Their lucky colors are metallic, such as gold or silver.
As for traveling, head west for better fortunes, says Chow.
People born in Snake years will enjoy good news and abundance as the travel star, Yi Ma Xing, and the fortune star, Cai Xing, will reign over them this year.
“Opportunities, new directions and advancements will come to you at work,” says Chow. “But Snakes need to find balance in life and take a break when needed.”
Romantically, Snakes may find love while out traveling this year. Chow advises them to wear blue or gold and travel to the west or north.
“This year, Horses will have the Peach Blossom Star (Taohua Xing) shining over them. That’s always good news,” says Chow.
Professionally, they’ll find new opportunities and meet a lot of guardians who will assist them.
They’ll enjoy good relationships. She says this might be the right year for those wanting to get engaged or married.
But Chow issues one reminder for Horses: Pay attention to their family’s physical and mental health.
“They can wear colorful clothes like pink, orange and a bit of yellow. In terms of traveling, they can head to their south,” says Chow.
This year, Goats will greet Tai Sui.
It’s generally a positive influence on their luck, but at the same time, it could also mean that the year will be exhausting too. That’s why Goats need to care for themselves and rest when needed.
“Save some time to get to know yourself better. Career-wise, you need to stay humble and keep a low profile. Observe more. Opportunities will present themselves at the right moment,” says Chow.
On the relationship front, people born in Goat years will enjoy a smooth year.
“They’re more likely to meet new people, new friends, and even new loves this year,” says Chow, adding that a bit of gold and a visit to the west could add to their luck.
Good news for Monkeys: they will be in harmonious union with Tai Sui this year.
Chow says they will be showered with admiration from those around them at work.
But that doesn’t mean they should live recklessly. Instead, the geomancer says, “they should play safe this year, especially those who love extreme sports.”
In terms of relationships, they are prone to arguments and drama, which could be avoided by improving communication this year.
Yellow and beige are the color palette for Monkeys in 2023, and they could look towards the west for travel inspiration, says Chow.
Roosters need to brace themselves – they will be clashing with Tai Sui this year, meaning the coming months could be unstable and present plenty of changes.
Advice from Chow: Embrace the chaos and travel more.
“Muster as much positive energy as you could and be more aware that you may be easier to attract conflicts this year,” she says. “But understand that these changes are for the better.”
To alleviate the blow, they could wear more yellow and brown and visit places in the west or north.
Being in union with Tai Sui, people born under the sign of the Dog will likely enjoy a pleasant year with significant advancements in career and finance.
But Dogs must remind themselves to be humble and listen to others, especially friends and people they trust, says Chow. They’ll tell you important things that will greatly benefit you this year.
“Their lucky colors are silver and blue, and their lucky place is to their north,” says Chow.
Pigs will be greeting Tai Sui, meaning it should generally be a positive year.
But, on the flip side, greeting Tai Sui could also affect one’s health because of the extra workload.
“You have to balance your work and play time equally,” Chow says.
People born during Pig years may enjoy professional success if they are willing to focus on teamwork.
“Relationship-wise, it’ll be a very good year for you. You will meet new friends and potential new love,” says Chow.
To enhance fortune, Pigs could wear pink and purple more often and plan a trip to the south, she adds.
People born in the years of the Rat will be in conflicts with Tai Sui, also known as Xing (torturing) Tai Sui, next year.
“Generally, it means a tougher year,” says Chow. “But when there is yin, there is always yang, too. So remember, it never really is all bad.”
Rats should be more cautious about health and work. They could be prone to minor injuries and miscommunication this year.
Chow urges them to wear cheerful colors – like pink and orange – and visit warmer places.
Oxen will enjoy an exciting year with the travel star and fortune star shining over them.
“They will find new opportunities and their finances will reach a new level. They’ll probably travel more for work and personal reasons. But since they’re traveling and working more, they need to be aware of their health,” says Chow.
Those who are single and looking for love may have some good luck this year.
Meanwhile, when choosing a travel destination, they could journey to the north, says Chow.
For those born in Tiger years, their “Ben Ming Nian” is over.
“That means, whatever tough times and instabilities they’re experiencing, it’s going to get better soon,” says Chow. “But patience is key because changes won’t be immediate.”
Tigers, especially those born in spring and summer, should take time to recover in the first half of the year and only make big decisions in the second half of the year, she says.
They should take things slowly in relationships and “save themselves some me-time.”
Wearing yellow, blue and brown could cheer them up. They could also travel to their north and west, concludes Chow.