According to MIT Geo Chemists, some of the first animals on the ground were the ancestors of the modern marine sponge, who discovered new evidence in many old stones. Credit: Jose Lewis Olores, MIT
A team of MIT Geo Chemists has detected new evidence in many old rocks, which shows that some of the first earth’s first animals were the ancestors of the modern marine sponge.
In a study The action of the National Academy of SciencesResearchers have reported that they have identified the “chemical fossil” that has been left by ancient sponsors in rocks, which are more than 541 million years old. A chemical fiancée is a biomolycol remnants that have begun from a living organism, which has been buried, changed and preserved in the sesame, sometimes for hundreds of millions of years.
The newly identified chemicals are special types of sternes, which are geographically stable, such as cholesterol, which are found in the cell membranes of complex organisms. Researchers tracked these special stenches to a class of marine sponnes known as Demo Spanjis. Today, demo spings come in a variety of sizes and colors, and lives in the oceans as a soft and scashion filter feeder. His ancient counterparts may have shared similar features.
“We do not know exactly that these organisms looked like at that time, but they lived in the sea, they live in a soft body, and we believe they do not have a silica skeleton,” the MIT’s Department of Earth, Environmental and Planet Sciences in the science of Geo -Biology Emirates.
The discovery of chemical fossils related to the group’s sponge has shown strong evidence that the ancestors of Demo Spings were among the first animals manufactured, and that they had done far more than the rest of the earth’s large animals.
The authors of this study, along with the top author and former MITEAPS Crosby Postdocratic fellow Lebanese Schwar, who is now a research scientist in Caltek, with Gordon Love at the University of California, USDS, Cornell University’s Benjamin Yuz -e -Alexevs, Goshum, Goshum, Goshum, Gyez, Goshim, Goshum, Goshum, Goshum, Grinchus. Electric Research’s Electric Research Electric Research with the New York College of Environmental Science and Forest University Jose Lewis General.
Sponsorship on steroids
This new research promotes the results that the group first reported in 2009. In this study, the team first identified the chemical gums that appeared to be derived from ancient sponsorship. He analyzed the samples of rocks from an outcred out of Oman and found a surprisingly stiranus, which he determined that 30 carbon (C) safe remains (C)30) A rare form of Stearols ST Stereide that he showed was derived from ancient marine sponnes.
Staines were found in the stones that were very old and were formed during the Adiacard – which extends from about 541 million to about 635 million years ago. This period happened just before Cambrian, when the Earth suffered a sudden and global explosion of complex multi -cellular life. The team’s discovery said that the ancient sponsorship was mostly more than a multi -faceted life, and was probably one of the first animals on Earth.
However, immediately after releasing these results, the alternate assumptions rotated to explain C30 The origin of the stencies, including this chemicals could be created through other groups of biology or through non -living geological processes.
The team says the new research has reinforced their first assumption that ancient sponsorship has surpassed this special chemical record, as they have identified a new chemical gash in the same primerian rocks that are almost certainly biological.
Evidence to make evidence
Just as in their previous tasks, researchers searched for chemical fossils in rocks that have removed the ads. He obtained samples from the drill core and output in Oman, Western India and Siberia and analyzed stones for the signatures of the stiranians, geographically stable shape, with all the ukraitis (plants, animals, and any organisms with a nucleus and membrane.
“If you do not have a sterol or comparison membrane lipids, you are not Ukrait,” says Simmons.
The infrastructure of a stereole consists of four fuse carbon rings. Additional carbon side chain and chemical ads can connect and expand to a sterol structure, depending on what specific genes of a organism can produce. In humans, for example, styrol cholesterol contains 27 carbon atoms, while plants usually contain 29 carbon atoms.
“It is very unusual to find a stereole with 30 carbs,” says Shwar.
The researchers identified in 2009 were chemical jovish 30 carbon stereole. In addition, the team vowed that the presence of a specific enzyme could be combined with the compound that was encoded by a gene that is common in Demopuniz.
In its new study, the team focused on the chemistry of these compounds and felt that the gene derived from the same sponge could produce a rare steer with 31 carbon atoms (C).31) When they analyzed the samples of their rocks for C31 Stiranians, they found in the aforementioned C. as well as in amazing abundance30 Styranians.
“These special stiors were there,” said Schwar, “said Shwar.” Finding them and really understanding their meaning and asking the right questions from where they come from. “
Researchers also obtained samples of modern -day demo spanongs and analyzed them for C31 Stearols. They found that really, CK Stearol -Biological prediction31 Strongs – found in stones – are located in some species of modern demopons. Moving one -step forward, they synthesized the eight different c -c.31 To verify their chemical structures as the standard of the Stearols reference in the lab. After that, they took action on the molecules in the ways that show that the stereole will change when hundreds of millions of years accumulate, bury and pressure.
They found that only two stereol products were exactly matches with C shape31 Starols that are found in ancient cliff patterns. The presence of two and the absence of the other six shows that these compounds were not manufactured by randomly non -biological processes.
Strengthening, reinforced by several inquiries, strongly supports the idea that the stiines found in ancient stones were really manufactured by living organisms rather than geological processes. In addition, those organisms were potentially ancestral ancestors of Demopunizes, which still maintain the ability to produce similar compounds.
“What is it in the rock, what is in the sponge, and a combination of what you can make in the chemistry laboratory,” says Saman. “You have three supporters, mutual consensus lines, which are included in the earliest animals of the earth, pointing to these sponsorship.”
“In this study we show that how to verify the biomarker, confirming that the signal really comes from life rather than pollution or non -biological chemistry.”
Now the team has shown C30 And c31 Starols are reliable indicators of ancient sponsorship, they intend to find chemicals in ancient stones from other parts of the world. They can only tell the cliffs that they have taken for the sidewalk, and the sponge, which became some time during the adversaries. With more samples, when some of these animals took shape, they will have the opportunity to tighten it.
More information:
Chemical properties of C31 Stearol from shower, Lebanese, sponsorship and neoprotoxic fossil stenol counterparts, The action of the National Academy of Sciences (2025) DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2503009122. Doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2503009122
Provided by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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Reference: The first animals on the earth are of sea sponsorship, suggest chemical fossils (2025, September 29) on September 30, 2025, https://phys.org/news/2025-09-nimals- IASEA-Se-se-cemical.html.html.
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