'Hugging' creature from brazil shakes up picture snake evolution
The first four legged fossil snake ever found is forcing scientists to rethink how snake evolved form lizards, Although it has four legs tetrapodophis amplectus has other features that clearly ark it as a snake, says nick longrich, a paleontologist at the university of bath, UK and one of the authors of a paper describing the animal is science
The creature's limba were probably not used for locomotion, the researchers say, but rather for grasping prey, or perhaps for holding on to mating partners, such speculation inspired the snake's nae, which loosely translates as 'four-legged hugging snake' tetrapodophis was originally fiound in the fossil-rich crato formation in northeastern brazil several decades ago. but its legs can be difficult to see at first glance ane it languished in aprivat collection after its discovery, assumed to be unremarkable.
the discovery comes in a major year for snake evolution research, cohn says. in january the snake fossil record was pushed back by soe 70 million years to the middle jurassic, around 160 million years ago, with the report of the oldest snake ever found although tetrapodophis is not the oldest snake, cohn says 'from a developmentive perspective, this could be one of the most important fossils ever found the combination of a snake-like body with complete forelimbs and hindlimbs is like a snake version of archaeopteryx'