Still waiting for trilobites

First they find a living  coelacanth, thought to have become extinct in the Cretaceous.

Then they find dawn redwood, growing in a grove in China.

Now Kenneth Mertens has found living cysts of a dinoflagellate thought to have become extinct in the early Pleistocene. This species, a remnant of the warmer Pliocene oceans, found refuge in the Indo-Pacific warm pool.

Modern and fossil cysts of Dapsilidinium pastielsii (from Mertens et al 2014)

I’m still holding out for a trilobite, but I’ll settle for an ammonite. Even a small one.

 

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