Science: Paleo-Teratology: Scientists unearth fossil of two-headed reptile:
Science: Paleo-Teratology: Scientists unearth fossil of two-headed reptile:
Observation 1: In the image below you can see in the right position a photo showing the fossil and in the left position a drawing showing how probably the animal was in past when it was alive ( Credit: drawing by Haiyan Tong)
Scientists have unearthed the fossil of a young, two-headed marine reptile that lived when dinosaurs still walked the Earth. The fossilized remains of this 150-million year old marine reptile, called Hyphalosaurus lingyuanensis, show clear signs of axial bifurcation, a deformation that causes an animal to be born with two heads. “My first reaction when I saw that fossil was of the ‘Oh my God!’ type,” said lead researcher Eric Buffetaut of the Center for National Scientific Research (CNRS) in Paris, France. “It’s something you would not really expect to see, because the chances of such a freak being fossilized are so slim.”
The discovery, detailed in the year of 2006 in a issue of the journal Biology Letters, marks the earliest known occurrence of a well-known birth deformity, called axial bifurcation, in living reptiles. This double-noggin phenomenon occurs when an embryo is damaged and some body parts develop twice. Buffetaut and his colleagues uncovered the remains in the Yixian Formation in northeastern China, a rich fossil deposit famous for its treasure trove of feathered dinosaur and early bird remains. The creature, called Hyphalosaurus lingyuanensis, died at a young age during the Cretaceous period 120 million years ago, during the twilight of the dinosaur’s reign.
While a reptile, Hyphalosaurus was not a dinosaur. Instead, it belonged to a diverse group of primitive aquatic and semi-aquatic creatures called choristoderes. Some choristoderes looked like lizards or crocodiles, while others resembled miniature versions of plesiosaurs, ancient marine reptiles with barrel-shaped bodies, short tails, paddle-like limbs and, in some cases, long serpentine necks — somewhat like the Loch Ness monster. Hyphalosaurus belonged to this last class of choristoderes. While the two-headed fossil was just over three inches long, an adult Hyphalosaurus could grow up to three feet in length and would have looked like a baby Nessie. “But the limbs were not flipper-like as in plesiosaurs,” Buffetaut said. “They were similar to lizard limbs.”
How the creature died is unclear. “It seems to have been a hatchling, and perhaps it was still-born,” Buffetaut told LiveScience. “In any case it didn’t live long.” The new baby Hyphalosaurus specimen not only had two heads; it also had two necks. While rare, this kind of deformation is well known among modern-day reptiles, including lizards, snakes, turtles and tortoises. Two-headed mammals, including sheep, calves and kittens, are also known but these animals don’t typically live as long. “Two-headed reptiles manage to survive for some time, probably because they have less complex brains and behaviors than birds or mammals”.
Some sources:
1) https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn10827-two-headed-lizard-spied-in-a-fossil/
2) https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna16710924
3) https://www.livescience.com/1234-ancient-reptile-heads.html
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