A new species of insect has been discovered from a 100-million year old fossil, found trapped in a piece of amber that was excavated in Myanmar. Being dubbed an "alien insect" by the press, the creature was so different from other known classifications of insect that entomologists have placed it in its own taxonomic order within the insect kingdom.
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Hint: Look Down – A student once found a valuable fossil just by looking down. Now a paleontologist has discovered some extraordinary fossils by looking at his kitchen counter.
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Deep in the deserted coal mines of Illinois lie?fossil forests!
These were some of the first forests on earth and have now all turned to stone, stretching for many miles?mostly on the ceilings of the mines.
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Three years ago, a college student in Arizona found a rare fossil because he happened to look down while walking on the sidewalk. Now, at another university?this time in Canada?a new faculty member found a cache of valuable fossils?stuffed under a ping pong table.
One of these is a pregnant fossil of an ancient dolphin-like creature called an ichthyosaur. In LiveScience.com, Andrea Thompson quotes newly-hired University of Alberta professor Michael Caldwell as saying, “It was pretty amazing to realize this valuable discovery had sat under a pingpong table for 25 years, but I suppose that after 100 million years in the dirt, it’s all relative.”
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