Dinosaur faeces yields 230-millionyear-old bugs, say scientists

ALMOST COMPLETELY preserved specimens of an ancient beetle species have survived an estimated 230 million years in petrified dinosaur excrement, an international research team has found.

The researchers were able to make the insect, called triamyxacoprolithica, visible using synchrotron microtomography, according to a paper published in the Current Biology journal.

The fossil excrement contains numerous bug parts, most of them belonging to the same small species, the research team wrote.

They noted that some insects were almost completely preserved, with many of the sensitive legs and antennae still intact.

Based on their recordings, the researchers created a 3D model of the bug. Co-author Martin Qvarnstroem said in a statement from Uppsala University he was surprised how well the insects had been preserved.”when you recreated them on the screen, it was as if they were looking right at you.”

Besides the Swedish researchers, scientists from Taiwan, Mexico,france and Germany were also involved.

The team suspects that the bugs might have been eaten by a relatively small dinosaur, a silesaurus, a species which is estimated to have had a body weight of 15 kilograms, living about 230 million years ago on the territory of present-day Poland.

The discovery that ancient insect specifies can be preserved in petrified excrement, or coprolites, is opening the gate into a new field of research. So far, most preserved insect fossils had been found in amber.

The oldest, however, are about 140 million years old, which is considered young, geologically speaking. With coprolites, researchers hope to be able to look back even further into the past and learn more about the evolution of insects in still unexplored time intervals. —