Can you imagine being stuck in a drawer for 145 years waiting to be rediscovered? That was the fate of the trilobite fossils in the collection of the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology. Sarah Losso, a Ph.D. candidate, stumbled upon these unique fossils while conducting research for her dissertation.
In a new study published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, Losso describes these rare three-dimensional trilobite fossils that reveal the soft undersides of the enrolled trilobites. This discovery sheds light on the evolutionary mechanisms that arthropods use to protect themselves.
Trilobites are fascinating creatures from the Paleozoic Era, and Losso’s study focused on fossils from the Mohawkian Stage of the Ordovician Period. These trilobites were entombed in a sediment slurry, leading to the exceptional preservation of their delicate tissues. This preservation is a rare find in the study of trilobites.
