Chinese scientists found that amber shrimp 22 million years ago is too rare
An amber wrapped with aquatic shrimp specimens 22 million years ago appeared on the 9th. The discovery team said that aquatic organisms preserved in amber are very rare. This' amber shrimp 'provides clues for scientists to study the transition of aquatic organisms from marine environment to freshwater environment. Previously, there was no report on the discovery of amber fossils of real shrimp in the world.
A research team from the Institute of zoology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nankai University and the Institute of Oceanography of the Chinese Academy of Sciences found the shrimp specimen. According to Dr. Chen Rui of the Institute of zoology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, this amber came from Central America and Mexico and was formed in the early Miocene about 22 million years ago, providing valuable evidence for understanding the ecosystem and biodiversity of the Gulf of Mexico at that time.
Chinese scientists have 'identified' the amber. Li Xinzheng, a researcher at the Institute of Oceanography of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said that the specimens are well preserved, the morphological characteristics are clearly visible, and the overall appearance is very similar to the living species of the family macrobrachiaceae, indicating that this kind of shrimp inhabits the estuarine environment, has a slender body and lives freely, and belongs to the subfamily macrobrachiaceae and the genus macrobrachiaceae.
Huang David, a professor at Nankai University, said, 'amber shrimp' is the oldest real shrimp found at present with gill nail groove and gill nail thorn on the head and chest plate, which is helpful to study the adaptive evolution of real shrimp species and provides clues for studying the transition of aquatic organisms from marine environment to freshwater environment.
The amber is currently stored in the stone exploration Museum of Zhongguancun Book Building in Beijing and is open to the public. Relevant research papers have recently been published in the scientific report, an academic journal of Nature Publishing Group.