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Science
Related: About this forumWhen Trilobites Ruled the World
WASHINGTON Trilobites may be the archetypal fossils, symbols of an archaic world long swept beneath the ruthless road grader of time. But we should all look so jaunty after half a billion years.
At the Smithsonians National Museum of Natural History, Brian T. Huber, chairman of paleobiology, points to a flawless specimen of Walliserops, a five-inch trilobite that swam the Devonian seas around what is now Morocco some 150 million years before the first dinosaurs hatched. With its elongated, triple-tined head horn and a bristle brush of spines encircling its lower body, the trilobite could be a kitchen utensil for Salvador Dalí. Nearby is the even older Boedaspis ensifer, its festive nimbus of spiny streamers pointing every which way like the ribbons of a Chinese dancer.
In a back room of the museum, Dr. Huber opens a drawer to reveal a dark, mouse-size and meticulously armored trilobite that has yet to be identified and that strains up from its sedimentary bed as though determined to break free.
A lot of people, when they see these fossils, dont believe theyre real, said Dr. Huber, who is 54, fit from years of fieldwork, and proud that the state fossil of his native Ohio is a trilobite. They think they must be artists models.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/04/science/when-trilobites-ruled-the-world.html
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When Trilobites Ruled the World (Original Post)
n2doc
Mar 2014
OP
I remember when Attenborough went to Marocco to look at them and the whole industry around them
jakeXT
Mar 2014
#2
Great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-
LiberalEsto
Mar 2014
#7
question everything
(47,486 posts)1. Oooo Kinda scary
Will hate to meet one of them in person..
Interesting story, though.
Maedhros
(10,007 posts)5. Think of them as big undersea pill bugs.
I think they'd make awesome pets!
jakeXT
(10,575 posts)2. I remember when Attenborough went to Marocco to look at them and the whole industry around them
(starts at 21 minutes)
progressoid
(49,991 posts)9. Very cool.
Feral Child
(2,086 posts)3. Very cool article.
Don't know why we like them, but we do.
Big, soggy pill-bugs.
REC
mindwalker_i
(4,407 posts)4. Maybe THAT'S what Mitch McConnell is
Are you sure they don't still rule the world?
BainsBane
(53,035 posts)6. No, you're looking at the underside of Donald Trump's toupee.
mindwalker_i
(4,407 posts)8. Yikes!
Imagine what his uncovered head would look like.
trusty elf
(7,394 posts)12. .......
[IMG][/IMG]
BainsBane
(53,035 posts)13. That's it!
You can tell it's the same species as the critter in the OP.
LiberalEsto
(22,845 posts)7. Great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-
GRANDMA!
byronius
(7,395 posts)10. n2doc, you're kinda like the most important member of this site.
Please to never die nor fade away in any fashion.
Yo_Mama
(8,303 posts)14. It's pretty cool that Ohio has a state fossil!
I knew about trilobites, but that was the first time I ever realized that a state had a fossil.