Worm-like fossil a 'distant cousin' of humans

A tiny worm-like creature that swam the seas half a billion years ago is not exactly the first thing that comes to mind when you think about who you share your genes with.

But according to a newly released analysis of a fossil unearthed in the Canadian Rockies a century ago, the finger-sized creatureknown as Pikaia gracilensis the oldest known member of the chordates a group containing all animals with a backbone,including humans.

"It's a very, very distant cousin," Jean-Bernard Caron, an assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Toronto and the study's co-author, said in an interview. "We share the same genes...we share some of the basic features."

However, the chance that humans might have evolved from the five-centemetre-long creature is a "long shot," cautioned Caron.

The research, published Monday in the British scientific journal Biological Reviews, determined Pikaia has a notochord, a flexible rod found in the embryos of all chordates that makes up part of the backbone in vertebrates.

It also found evidence of a nerve cord and vascular system and extensive myomeres, blocks of skeletal muscle tissue that are characteristic of chordates.

Professor Simon Conway Morris of the University of Cambridge, the study's lead author, said the findings of myomeres clearly places Pikaia as the planet's most primitive chordate.

"The discovery of myomeres is the smoking gun that we have long been seeking," Morris said in a news release. "Next time we put the family photograph on the mantelpiece, there in the background will be Pikaia."

Pikaia likely swam above the sea floor by moving its body in a series of side-to-side curves.

The fossil was discovered in 1911 in the Burgess Shale fossil beds in Yoho National Park in Western Canada. It was placed in the care of the Smithsonian Institute and stored away in Washington for decades until the early 70s, when Morris referred to it as a likely chordate in a scientific paper.

Members of the Royal Ontario Museum went back to the fossil beds in the 1990s and found more specimens. Caron, who arrived at the ROM in 2006 as curator of invertebrate palaeontology, teamed up with Morris to better describe the Pikaia.

The findings are prompting researchers at the ROM to return to the fossil beds this summer to look for more specimens to help determine if there are chordate cousins of Pikaia, Caron said

"Was Pikaea alone at the time, I don't think so, I think there were more."