Researchers said they found remains of the earliest-known ichthyosaur, a 10-feet long top predator which lived approximately 2 million years after Earth's worst mass extinction that ended the Permian Period.
A computed tomography image and cross-section shows the internal bone structure of vertebrae from the earliest-known IchthyosaurWASHINGTON - Ichthyosaurs were a successful group of marine reptiles that prospered during the age of dinosaurs, some reaching up to around 70 feet long - exceeded in size in the history of Earth's oceans only by the largest of the whales.
Like whales, which are mammals, and the various other reptile lineages that have inhabited Earth's oceans, ichthyosaurs evolved from ancestors that walked on land and underwent a land-to-sea transition. "The implications of this discovery are manifold, but most importantly indicate that the long-anticipated transitional ichthyosaur ancestor must have appeared much earlier than previously suspected," Kear added.In light of this discovery, it may be that ichthyosaur origins predated the mass extinction event by up to perhaps 20 million years, Kear said.
Many ichthyosaurs looked like dolphins, except with vertical rather than horizontal tail flukes. Others resembled large whales. The biggest included Shastasaurus, at about 70 feet . They ate fish and squid. Fossils show ichthyosaurs giving live birth to their young.
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