Scientists have identified a fossil previously found in the Scottish Highlands. It turned out to be an organism with two different types of cells that was born and died about one billion years ago.
A related study appeared in the journal Current Biology. Specialists from the University of Sheffield and scientists from Boston College (USA) have studied in detail the fossil, which is about one billion years old.
It contained a microfossil containing two different types of cells. Thus, this organism may be the earliest multicellular organism known to world science.
At the same time, the find provides a new understanding of the evolutionary process, namely the transition from unicellular organisms to complex multicellular organisms and further to animals. Scientists believe that this creature was an intermediate link between unicellular and multicellular.
It turns out that this is exactly the missing link that scientists have not been able to find for a very long time. The authors of the discovery named it Bicellum Brasieri.
“The origins of complex multicellularity and the origins of animals are considered two of the most important events in the history of mankind and life on Earth, and our discovery sheds new light on both of these issues.
We discovered a primitive spherical organism made up of two different types of cells, which was the first step towards a complex multicellular structure that has never been described before in the fossil record, “explains one of the main authors of the study, Professor Charles Wellman.
According to him, the discovery suggests that the evolution of multicellular occurred at least one billion years ago.
In addition, the find suggests that events preceding evolution could have occurred not only in salt water, but also in fresh lake water.
“Biologists have hypothesized that the origins of animals involved the incorporation and reuse of prior genes that had previously developed in unicellular organisms.
What we see in Bicellum is an example of a genetic system involving cell-cell adhesion and cell differentiation that could have been incorporated into the animal's genome half a billion years later, ”explains Professor Paul Stroter of Boston College.
The fossil was found in the northwest of the Scottish Highlands in Loch Torridon. Its good preservation made it possible to study it at the cellular and subcellular levels.
Previously, Rambler reported on why the Patomsky crater baffles scientists.
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