Researchers studying fossils from Australia have discovered what they believe to be the oldest known ancestor of all animal life on Earth, including humans. Described as a "little worm-like creature,quot;, it was basically a small fleshy tube that did little more than eat and defecate. For some of us, that description might come too close to home.

The discovery, which is the subject of a new article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reveals some key details about the creature we can all trace our ancestry to. The worm organism has been named Ikaria wariootia, but what it lacks in a striking name it makes up for in being, well, almost completely irrelevant.

This ancient creature lived about 555 million years ago, and evidence of its movements has been discovered for 15 years. However, finding the tiny burrows left by pint-sized animals left scientists with the difficult job of figuring out who made them. Without finding fossils of the creatures themselves, the researchers relied heavily on technology to tell them what the animals were like.

Using 3D scanning technology to create a digital model of the fossilized burrows, the researchers were able to create a realistic example of the worm animals that inhabited them. It is described that they are not more than seven millimeters and less than three millimeters wide, although they present a crucial feature for the development of animal life: bilateral symmetry.

It probably had a rudimentary "mouth,quot; as well as a rear opening, both connected to a central intestine. He ate and defecated, but beyond that, we don't know much about it. However, it was probably our oldest ancestor, and its existence is an important milestone in the history of our planet.

"We thought these animals should have existed during this interval, but we always understood that they would be difficult to recognize," Scott Evans, lead author of the paper, said in a statement. "Once we had the 3-D scans, we knew we had made an important discovery."

As for actually finding a fossil of Ikaria wariootia The possibilities themselves are incredibly slim. Bones are excellent fossil candidates because they can persist for long periods of time, while meat and tissues decompose much more easily. Similarly, the burrows made by these little creatures in the soft sediment of the ocean floor froze over time, while the creatures themselves were lost.

Image source: Sohail Wasif / UCR