Scientists from the University of Oxford helped discover a new species of spikey mollusc.
A half-a-billion-year-old spiny slug has shed light on the origins of animals like oysters and octopuses, researchers have said.
The fossil, called Shishania aculeata, reveals that the earliest molluscs were flat, shell-less slugs covered in a protective spiny armour.First author Guangxu Zhang, a recent PhD graduate from China's Yunnan University who discovered the specimens, said the fossils were "completely different" from any others he had seen.
This diversity evolved very quickly a long time ago, and very few fossils have been left behind that chronicle their early evolution.
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