Excavating strange creatures 500 million years old

The fossil creature shaped like a cigar, lived 520 million years ago was discovered by paleontologist Andrew Smith of the Natural History Museum and colleagues in the sediment in the Anti-mountain range. Atlas in Morocco.

The strange creature's shape lived 500 million years ago.

This creature lives at the bottom of an ancient continental shelf called Gondwana in the Cambrian period, when life only exists on the sea and is named Helicocystis moroccoensis . This is the oldest echinoderm ever found by humans, the ancestor of today's sea urchins and starfish.

Possessing a body like a cigar with a diameter of up to 4cm, this animal's mouth is on the top of the body. The body of this species can stretch itself, varying in length and length.

The hunting mechanism of this animal is also very special, when they can completely filter the plankton floating in the water. When the mouth on the head opens, water and plankton will be kept inside H.moroccoensis's body. When water is pushed out, plankton will be trapped and become a source of nutrition for H.moroccoensis.

Not only is the creature bizarre, H.moroccoensis is also unique when it is considered one of the earliest calcium-bearing animals. Appearing in 10–15 million years after the first animal that possessed the calcium skeleton was recorded, H.moroccoensis will help clarify the evolution of the echinoderms that have existed on Earth.