Download "MISSING LINK" FOUND: New Fossil Links Humans

"MISSING LINK" FOUND: New Fossil Links Humans, Lemurs?
Leah Marks
On May 19, 2009 a small primate ancestor researchers call Ida was unveiled at the
American Museum of Natural History. Ida is 47 million years old; she could be the
missing link we have been looking for all these years. She is not a direct human ancestor,
but she is an ancestor. This discovery has had huge media attention. Ida is one of the
major breakthroughs of modern evolution studies.
Although Ida is not a direct descendent of humans, she had remarkably human
features. She has a flat face not like that of a lemur, she has relatively dull teeth, and she
has nails not claws and relatively short arms and legs. Scientists find Ida remarkable for
her human like features. Ida features are typical of modern monkeys, apes and humans.
What is remarkable is that she had these features 47 million years ago.
Ida is a juvenile female that died when she was only about nine or ten months old.
She lived in a rainforest environment near Frankfurt, Germany where she was found. She
lived with a variety of other primates, birds and reptiles. Ida’s world was not like ours.
She lived in a time called The Eocene. It was much warmer and the earth was shifting.
She lived in the world most of us wish we could live in. She gives us an insight into the
world of 47 million years ago.
Although Ida gives us an insight into her world we still wonder why Ida and her
contemporaries became extinct. Ida was found in the messel pit. The messel pit is a
quarry in near Frankfurt, Germany in the village of Messel. Messel has been a great
place to explore the Eocene and other time periods. Ida wasn’t the only fossil found
there. Ida’s contemporaries were also found there. Ida is a huge discovery for scientists
in human evolution. She gives us into “the missing link” that we have been looking for.
Ida’s connection to humans is not direct but she has a clear connection to primates. Ida is
the oldest complete fossil found. She is remarkable in that she shows us how the world
worked 47 million years ago.
Ida is a remarkable find for scientists and for the world. She fills in a huge
evolutionary gap. With Ida the study of human evolution can advance and we can figure
out exactly where we came from. Scientists can see exactly what the world was like and
we can no longer go on an endless search for the missing link. Ida is a very important
discovery.
Websites Used
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/05/090519-missing-link-found.html
http://www.revealingthelink.com/