Earth has seen many different and strange life forms over hundreds of millions of years. Scientists examine fossils to understand the evolution of life in the past and in this way understand the Earth we live in today. However, recently an astonishing and incredible scientific discovery of a completely earth-shattering form of life in the past was made in Britain.
Scientists have discovered a fossil in Scotland that is not classified as a plant, animal or fungus. This ancient life form, called Prototaxites, is 410 million years old and stands 26 feet tall, making it the tallest life on land at the time.
They predict that the time elapsed since its extinction was 360 million years ago and therefore it became extinct 370 million years ago. This was discovered through the sedimentary layer called Rhynie chert, from which much information about life on land is derived.
Previous insights into this plant-like creature indicated to scientists that it was a giant fungus, but this is not the case; this creature followed a different evolutionary path. In fact, this creature resembles a completely extinct group.
This finding was described by a researcher from National Museums Scotland as a major breakthrough in a debate that has lasted more than 165 years. Another researcher at the University of Edinburgh claimed that they had shown that Prototaxites did not belong to any known group of complex life forms, but represented an experiment on how life on Earth formed complex structures on land.
Prototaxites lived between 420 and 370 million years ago during a period when life on Earth began to be dominated by plants, animals and fungi. Although it can be considered the tallest life form to ever walk the earth, it has now been surpassed by trees. The scientific study of the new fossils will be housed at the National Museums Collections Center in Edinburgh.
