The first-born creature was born on our planet 558 million years ago.
The first animal on Earth was Dickinsonia - a kind of soft symmetrical cake that resembled either a feather or a palm branch. In the forefathers or foremothers, she was identified by paleontologists led by our compatriot Ilya Bobrovskiy, now working at the Australian University (Research School of Earth Sciences, Australian National University).
The findings of scientists are detailed in an article titled "Ancient steroids establish the Ediacaran fossil Dickinsonia as one of the earliest animals" in the journal Science. Briefly summarizes the essence - the newspaper The Guardian.
Dickinsonies are famous creatures. Lived about 560 million years ago. But were they animals? The scientific world could not decide on this. Some considered "cakes" to be plants, others - mushrooms, still others - lichens, and some did not "hold" Dickinsonias as independent creatures at all, but believed that they were colonies of bacteria.
Dickinsonia petrified.
Some representatives of the "mystery of nature" reached almost one and a half meters in diameter. But there were also small ones - several millimeters each.
An oval dickinsonia cake - something like this it looked like during its lifetime 558 million years ago.
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Ilya Bobrovsky personally mined the remains of two Dickinsonias - he removed them from a cliff located in Pomorie. The study showed that organic matter was preserved on the fossils. Scientists have determined their composition. And they found a high concentration of cholesterol. This meant only one thing: the Dickinsonians were animals. After all, only representatives of the animal world - cholesterol - produce it.
The cliff on the White Sea from which the fossilized remains of Dickinsonia were recovered.
The current discovery of paleontologists testifies that the first animals appeared long before the so-called Cambrian explosion, which happened about 540 million years ago - the animals then suddenly suddenly multiplied. The Dickinsonies started up much earlier - at least 20 million years ago.
Ilya Bobrovsky scrapes cholesterol from fossilized Dickinsonia.
VLADIMIR LAGOVSKY