9 May 2025 The Future is the Product of the Past

490-Million-Year-Old Trilobites Could Solve Ancient Geography Puzzle

The humble trilobites may be extinct, but even as fossils, they can teach us much about our planet’s history. Indeed, ancient arthropods from nearly half a billion years ago, including ten newly discovered species,  may be key to understanding Thailand’s place on the former supercontinent Gondwana.

Trilobites are extinct sea creatures with half-moon-shaped heads that breathed through their legs. A 100-page monograph in the British journal offers great detail about the new species, including one named in honor of Thai Royal Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn.

The trilobite fossils were trapped between layers of petrified ash in sandstone, the product of old volcanic eruptions that settled on the sea floor and formed a green layer called a tuff. Unlike some other kinds of rocks or sediment, tuffs contain crystals of zircon — a mineral that formed during an eruption and are, as the name of the rock layer containing them suggests, tough.

Zircon is chemically stable as well as heat and weather resistant. It is hard as steel and persists when minerals in other kinds of rocks erode. Inside these resilient zircon crystals, individual atoms of uranium gradually decay and transform into atoms of lead.

“We can use radio isotope techniques to date when the zircon formed and thus find the age of the eruption, as well as the fossil,” said Nigel Hughes, monograph co-author and UC Riverside geology professor.

It is rare to find tuffs from this particular period of time, the late Cambrian period, between 497 and 485 million years ago. “Not many places around the world have this. It is one of the worst dated intervals of time in Earth’s history,” Hughes said.

Artist's rendering of a trilobite based on preserved soft body parts. (Nobu Tamura)
Artist’s rendering of a trilobite based on preserved soft body parts. (Nobu Tamura)

“The tuffs will allow us to not only determine the age of the fossils we found in Thailand, but to better understand parts of the world like China, Australia, and even North America where similar fossils have been found in rocks that cannot be dated,” said Shelly Wernette, former Hughes lab geologist now at Texas State University, and first author of the monograph.

The fossils were uncovered on the coast of an island called Ko Tarutao. It is about 40 minutes southwest from the mainland via high-speed boat and is part of a UNESCO geopark site that has encouraged international teams of scientists to work in this area.

For Wernette, the most interesting discovery was 12 types of trilobites that have been seen in other parts of the world, but never in Thailand before. “We can now connect Thailand to parts of Australia, a really exciting discovery.”

During the trilobites’ lifetime, this region was on the outer margins of Gondwanaland, an ancient supercontinent that included Africa, India, Australia, South America, and Antarctica.

“Because continents shift over time, part of our job has been to work out where this region of Thailand was in relation to the rest of Gondwanaland,” Hughes said. “It’s a moving, shape shifting, 3D jigsaw puzzle we’re trying to put together. This discovery will help us do that.”

Location of the fossil discoveries. Credit: Shelly Wernette/UCR
Location of the fossil discoveries. Credit: Shelly Wernette/UCR

For example, take the species named for Royal Princess Sirindhorn. The species was named in tribute to the princess for her steadfast dedication to developing the sciences in Thailand. “I also thought this species had a regal quality. It has a broad headdress and clean sweeping lines,” Wernette said.

If researchers can get a date from the tuffs containing her namesake species, Tsinania sirindhornae, and determine when they lived, they will be able to say that closely related species of Tsinania found in northern and southern China are roughly the same age.

Ultimately, the researchers feel that the pictures of the ancient world hidden in the fossils they found contain invaluable information for the present day.

“What we have here is a chronicle of evolutionary change accompanied by extinctions. The Earth has written this record for us, and we’re fortunate to have it,” Hughes said. “The more we learn from it the better prepared we are for the challenges we’re engineering on the planet for ourselves today.”

DOI: 10.1002/spp2.1516

University of California

Cover image: Wikipedia

Related Articles

New Archaeological Discoveries in Abu Dhabi shed light on Umm an-Nar Bronze Age culture (2700-2000 BCE)

1 February 2024

1 February 2024

New findings demonstrate the resilience and inventiveness of local Bronze Age societies (Umm an-Nar Bronze Age culture), as well as...

Skeleton Of “Spanish Monk” in Palace of Cortés Turns Out To Be An Aztec Woman

26 January 2024

26 January 2024

Recent research at the Palace of Cortés in Cuernavaca, Mexico, has revealed a grave historical error. For 50 years, it...

China’s ancient water pipes show people mastered complex engineering 4,000 years ago without the need for a centralized state authority

16 August 2023

16 August 2023

A system of ancient ceramic water pipes, the oldest ever unearthed in China, shows that neolithic people were capable of...

Excavation in Larissa finds a Hellenistic era sanctuary

27 November 2021

27 November 2021

The Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sport reported on Friday the discovery of ancient Greek and Hellenistic era structures at...

The first Iberian lead plate inscribed with an archaic script was found at Pico de Los Ajos in Yátova

13 June 2021

13 June 2021

At the Pico de Los Ajos site in Valencia, Spain, a rare lead sheet engraved in ancient Iberian was unearthed....

Astonishing Find in the Czech Republic: Hikers Discover a 3.7 Kilogram Serbian/Bosnian Gold Treasure

29 April 2025

29 April 2025

A leisurely hike on the slopes of Zvičina Hill in the Czech Republic turned into an extraordinary discovery for two...

2.3-meter sword found in 4th-century tomb in Japan

27 January 2023

27 January 2023

The largest bronze mirror and the largest “dako” iron sword in Japan were discovered at the Tomio Maruyama burial mound...

Aramaic four inscriptions found for the first time in eastern Turkey

17 September 2022

17 September 2022

Four inscriptions written in Aramaic were discovered in the ancient city with a grid plan, located on an area of...

Ancient Greeks Built a Road to Haul Cargo Overland: The Father of the Railway: Diolkos

6 May 2024

6 May 2024

The Diolkos, an ambitious road that crossed the entire Isthmus of Corinth and was partially paved with stone, was built...

‘Australia’s silk road’: the quarries of Mithaka Country dating back 2100 years

4 April 2022

4 April 2022

In Queensland’s remote Channel Country of red dirt and gibber rock, traditional owners and archaeologists have unearthed what researchers have...

“Oracle Bone Inscriptions”, the world’s oldest writing system that has not disappeared in history

5 June 2023

5 June 2023

“Jiaguwen,” or the oracle bone inscriptions, are thought to be the earliest fully-developed characters as well as the source of...

The Oldest Evidence of Stone Blade Production in Southern Arabia: 80,000-Year-Old Stone Blades Discovered

21 February 2025

21 February 2025

An international team of researchers led by Knut Bretzke of Friedrich Schiller University Jena uncovered 80,000-year-old stone blades at the...

16th-Century Compass Possibly Belonging to Nicolaus Copernicus Unearthed in Poland’s Frombork

8 August 2024

8 August 2024

Researchers have discovered a 16th-century compass that is thought to have been used by astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus in the canonical...

Medieval ship found off the west coast of Sweden

5 February 2022

5 February 2022

A previously undiscovered wreck has been found outside of Fjällbacka on the Swedish west coast. Analysis of wood samples shows...

300-Year-Old Sacred Mummified Mermaid From Japan’s Mystery Solved

20 February 2023

20 February 2023

A mummified mermaid has been worshiped in Japan for centuries because locals believe it has healing powers. However, upon closer...