Study reveals bone-eating worms have existed for 100 million years
Photo of Osedax. Courtesy: University of Plymouth
Digital Reporter
Wednesday, April 15, 2015, 4:55 PM - A new study has shed new light on the nature of 'zombie worms' -- bone-eating creatures that were thought to have evolved alongside whales.
Researchers at the University of Plymouth have discovered the worms -- called Osedax -- date back to prehistoric times when they fed on the carcasses of massive marine reptiles.
It's believed these 'zombie worms' evolved at least 100 million years ago and dined on the bones of the plesiosarus and sea turtles.
The Osedax was first discovered in 2002, and the genus can still be found in numerous oceans.
Today, the scavengers feed on the bones of dead whales and have been known to devour entire carcasses.
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Researchers found traces of prehistoric Osedax on pelsiosaur fossils held at the University of Cambridge.
Dr. Nicholas Higgs, a Research Fellow in the Marine Institute, said the finding is important.
"The exploration of the deep sea in the past decades has led to the discovery of hundreds of new species with unique adaptations to survive in extreme environments, giving rise to important questions on their origin and evolution through geological time," he said in a statement.
"The unusual adaptations and striking beauty of Osedax worms encapsulate the alien nature of deep-sea life in public imagination."
The study also disputes the widely-held belief the worms evolved alongside whales.
"...Our discovery shows that these bone-eating worms did not co-evolve with whales, but that they also devoured the skeletons of large marine reptiles that dominated oceans in the age of the dinosaurs. Osedax, therefore, prevented many skeletons from becoming fossilised, which might hamper our knowledge of these extinct leviathans," Dr. Higgs adds.
The complete paper can be found in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters.
Source: University of Plymouth
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