Myllokunmingia

Myllokunmingia

Chengjiang Faunengemeinschaft, (China)

Myllokunmingia is a vertebrate from the Cambrian Maotianshan slate in China. The animal has similarities with the modern hagfish and reaches 28 mm in length and 6 mm in height, it is most likely a pine Loser ( primitive fish)

With an age of about 530 million years ago Myllokunmingia is thus the oldest known vertebrate that has been found in rocks of the Cambrian. The fossil has a skull and skeleton-like structures that are probably made ​​up of cartilage tissue - comparable to the lampreys, which are also counted among the vertebrates. For mineralization of skeletal elements ( biomineralization ) there are no signs.

Description

The holotype comes from the Chengjiang Faunengemeinschaft and was in the Eoredlichia - Trilobitenzone in Haikou near Ercaicun, Kunming, Yunnan Province discovered. The animal has a clearly defined head area, the torso has a sail-like front (1.5 mm ) dorsal fin, later a (probably paired ) pelvic fin lobes. At the top there are five or six gill pockets Hemibranchien. In the trunk region lie outside 25 muscle segments ( myomeres ) that are arranged in a reverse directional herringbone pattern. The animal still has a notochord, a pharynx and digestive tract, possibly extending to the rear end. The mouth can not be clearly identified. Possibly a pericardium is present. Bones can not be seen. Only one individual find the tail end is covered by sediment.

Myllokunmingia fengjiaoa ( Shu, Zhang & Han) is ( so far) the only known Art

Another Myllokunmingia quite similar finding from the slate is Haikouichthys. There are in addition a number of controversial front Chordata ( primitive Hemichrodata ).