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Dangling Eyes of Ancient Sea Predator Discovered

by Jennifer Welsh

he biggest, scariest predator of the ancient Cambrian oceans just got a lot more menacing: Researchers have found a pair of fossilized eyes that show the beast had excellent vision.

“The animal itself has been known for quite some time, but we’ve never known the detail of the eyes,” study researcher John Paterson, of the University of New England in Australia, told LiveScience. “It can tell us a great deal about how it saw its world and it also supports that it’s one of the key predators during the Cambrian period.”

The group of predators in question, which belong to the genus Anomalocaris, could reach more than 3 feet (1 meter) long and lived in shallow oceans more than 500 million years ago. The researchers call it the “world’s first apex predator,” because it had highly acute vision and was much larger than other animals in the ocean at that time. It also had large claws and toothlike serrations in its mouth to tear apart trilobites…

(read more: Live Science)     (image: Katrina Kenny & University of Adelaide)