New species named after Michael Jackson

Added: (Tue Jan 10 2012)

Pressbox (Press Release) - Press Release Oertijdmuseum Boxtel, the Netherlands: Fossil Hermit Crab named after Michael Jackson
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Fossil Hermit Crab named after Michael Jackson
On Thursday June 25th 2009, an international team of paleontologists did a great discovery in northern Spain. Not only did they find a new species of hermit crab, but it also appeared to represent a new genus, and even a new family was erected after careful study. Even more impressive was the day of the spectacular find. The paleontologists learned the same evening in a local restaurant in the city of Alsasua that the ‘King of Pop’ had passed away that day. Thus, they decided to honor Michael Jackson by naming the new species after him: Mesoparapylocheles michaeljacksoni.
“We discovered the shield of the new hermit crab in an abandoned limestone quarry in the foothills of the Pyrenees in the Spanish province Navarra,” explains co-author Adiël Klompmaker, a PhD-candidate in the Geology Department of Kent State University. “These rocks in the Koskobilo quarry are part of a fossil coral reef with an age of 100 million years. This is right in the middle of the Cretaceous period, when dinosaurs were dominating the continents. In this area in northern Spain, we find many invertebrate fossils such as corals, algae, sea urchins, but also a wide variety of crabs. ”
Mesoparapylocheles michaeljacksoni has one living relative from the same family. Parapylocheles scorpio lives in deep waters of the Indian and Pacific Oceans. “However, the new hermit crab lived in the shallow waters of a coral reef hidden in between the branching corals,” tells lead author and director of the Dutch Oertijdmuseum René Fraaije. Still undiscovered species of the same family must, thus, have migrated to deeper waters at some point in time.
Nowadays, hermit crabs predominantly use a snail shell as a shelter when the shell comes available after the death of the snail. When the extinct ammonites were still around in the Cretaceous, they would also use their shell sometimes. Klompmaker: “We are not sure what the fossil hermit crabs from Spain used as a protection, because snail and ammonite shells are extremely rare in the quarry. They may have relied on the additional protection provided by the branching corals, as hermit crabs are rare in rocks from the same quarry that contain few corals.”
Fossil shields of hermit crabs are much rarer than those of true crabs (Brachyura), which are a separate group within the decapod crustaceans. Today, less than a dozen of these shields are known and much concerning the evolution of this group still remains undiscovered.
The Oertijdmuseum Boxtel is one of the leading institutes in the world studying fossil decapod crustaceans such as crabs, lobsters, shrimp, and hermit crabs.
The scientific publication on the new species and yet another new species and genus is just published online: Fraaije, R.H.B., A.A. Klompmaker, & P. Artal. 2012. New species, genera and a family of hermit crabs (Crustacea, Anomura, Paguroidea) from a mid-Cretaceous reef of Navarra, northern Spain. Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie Abhandlungen 263: 85-92. http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/schweiz/njbgeol/2012/00000263/00000001/art00010





The shield of Mesoparapylocheles michaeljacksoni. The legs and abdomen (back part) were not preserved, which is a typical preservation style for decapod crustaceans in the quarry in Spain. The scale bar is 1.0 mm.

The living species Parapylocheles scorpio.




Contact information:

Dr. René H.B. Fraaije, Palaeontologist,
Oertijdmuseum, Boxtel , the Netherlands (www.oertijdmuseum.nl)
Phone: 0031-411-616861, info@oertijdmuseum.nl

And/or

Drs. Adiël A. Klompmaker, PhD Candidate
Department of Geology
Kent State University
McGilvrey Hall 235c
Summit & Lincoln Streets
Kent , Ohio 44242, USA
Phone: +1 330 672 2680 (work)
Fax: 330-672-7949
Email: aklompma@kent.edu
Website: http://www.personal.kent.edu/~aklompma/

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