‘Dune’-like sandworms crawled on Earth more than 500 million years ago

The razor-toothed sandworms which were seen inhabiting the deserts of Arrakis in the movie “Dune: Part Two” have starksimilarities with something that existed as a predator on Earth nearly 500 million years ago.

These ancient Selkirkia worms, which are likely to have crawled on Earth during the Cambrian Explosion, existed inside long and cone-shaped tubes and were among the most common predators present on the seafloor.

Speaking about the worm, Karma Nanglu, a palaeontologist at Harvard University, said, “If you were a small invertebrate coming across them, it would have been your worst nightmare. It’s like being engulfed by a conveyor belt of fangs and teeth.”

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However, these ravenous worms disappeared from Earth hundreds of millions of years ago.

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Analysed fossils of these worms reveal secrets hidden for years

A trove of fossils, recovered from Morocco, was recently analysed and revealed that these predators, which were only 1 or 2 inches in length, existed much longer than earlier believed.

In a paper which was published in the journal Biology Letters on Tuesday (April 2),Nanglu's teamsaid that the new species of Selkirkia worm lived for more than 25 million years after they were believed to have gone extinct.

Nanglu and his colleagues found the tubular worms while sifting through fossils kept in the collection of Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology.

The fossils belonged to Fezouata Formation in Morocco which is a deposit that belongs to the Early Ordovician period which started around 488 million years ago and spanned across 45 million years.

While looking into the specimens of the museum, they noticed various fiery-hued fossils of tapering tubes, which appeared identical to Selkirkia fossils, found in ancient Cambrian deposits like the Burgess Shale.

“We don’t expect this guy to be around any more. It’s 25 million years out of place," said Nanglu. After analysing it closely, it was confirmed that these were the tubes of a new species of Selkirkia worm.

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The new species was named tsering, which means “long life” in the Tibetan language, by the researchers.

The new species not only enlarged Selkirkia worms' temporal record but also confirmed that they lived in environments which are closer to the South Pole, where Morocco was located in the Ordovician period.

As per the Royal Ontario Museum's paleontologist in Toronto Jean-Bernard Caron, who was not a part of the new paper, the discovery highlighted that few Cambrian creatures were able to exist even though diversity exploded in the Ordovician era.

“This new study adds to a growing body of evidence that many members of Cambrian communities continued to thrive during the following Ordovician period and were not quickly replaced as previous evolutionary models might have suggested,” he said.

(With inputs from agencies)