There were certainly no Muppets in the Permian period, but there was a Kermit—or at least a precursor to modern amphibians named after the famous frog.
Scientists on Thursday described the fossilized skull of a creature called Kermitops gratus that lived about 270 million years ago in what is now Texas. It is believed to belong to three extant branches of amphibians – the lineage of frogs, salamanders and limbless caecilians.
Although only a skull about 3 centimeters long has been found, researchers believe Kermitopus had a sturdy, salamander-like body that was about 15-18 centimeters long, although salamanders would not evolve for about 100 million years.
Amphibians are one of four living groups of terrestrial vertebrates, the other two being reptiles, birds and mammals. The unique features of Kermitops’s skull – a combination of ancient features and more advanced features – provide clues to understanding the evolution of amphibians.
“Kermitops helps us understand the early history of amphibians by revealing that amphibians did not progressively become more like modern amphibians,” said Calvin So, a doctoral student in paleontology at George Washington University and lead author of the study. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society.
The fossil was collected near Camp Lake, Texas, in 1984 and preserved in the extensive collection of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington, but had not been thoroughly studied until recently.
Kermitops has a rounded snout, not unlike frogs and salamanders. Its eye sockets preserved palpebral bones, a feature not found in today’s amphibians. Its skull was made of roof-like bones, in contrast to the thin, pillar-like bones of modern amphibians.
“The length of the skull in front of the eyes is longer than behind the eyes, which is different from other amphibian fossils that lived at the same time. We think this may have allowed Kermitopus to close its mouth more quickly, allowing it to capture fast insect prey,” “Su said.
The fossil record of early amphibians and their ancestors is spotty, making it difficult to figure out the origins of modern amphibians.
“Kimitopus, with its unique anatomy, really exemplifies the importance of continuing to add new fossil data to understand this evolutionary question,” said study co-author Arjan Mann, a paleontologist at the National Museum of Natural History. sex.”
Kermit the Frog was created in 1955 by the late American puppeteer Jim Henson. The Kermit puppets produced in the 1970s are collected by the Smithsonian National Museum of American History as important artifacts.
Kermitops means “Kermit face” and is a nod to the humorous look of the Muppets.
“We think the eyelid bones gave the fossil a bug-like look, and combined with the lopsided smile caused by slight squeezing during preservation of the fossil, we really think it looked like Kermit the Frog,” Su said.
Kermitops belongs to a group called temnospondyls, which emerged tens of millions of years after the first land vertebrates evolved from fish ancestors. The largest brachiospondyls look superficially like crocodiles, including two species of crocodiles with a body length of about 6 meters: Prionosuchus and Mastodonsaurus.
Tennospondyls are thought to be the ancestors of modern amphibians, Mann said.
Kermitops existed about 20 million years before the worst mass extinction in Earth’s history and predated the first dinosaurs by about 40 million years. It lived alongside other members of the amphibian lineage, as well as the impressive Dimetrodon pelvis, a predator related to the mammalian lineage.
The environment in which Kermitop lived appears to have alternated between warm, wet seasons and hot, dry seasons.
“This environment is similar to modern monsoons that occur in the southwestern United States and Southeast Asia,” Su said.
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