The alien-like underwater creature dubbed the "Tully Monster" continues to baffle scientists. It is believed that the creature existed almost 300 million years ago in the muddy coastal waters of north-east Illinois.
According to Mail Online, the "Tully Monster" is believed to be the strangest undersea creature to have ever lived. It had a strange tubular body, eyes on the end of stalks and teeth on the end of a long narrow trunk. Its fossils were first discovered 58 years ago in the Mazon Creek fossil beds in central Illinois. Two groups of scientists last year claimed that the "Tully Monster" belonged to a class of vertebrate, which resembles one kind of fish called lamprey.
A new research, though, has negated the old classification and re-ignited the mystery of the "Tully Monster". According to the scientists, the weird characteristics of the ancient animal has made it unfit for any particular classification. The strange "Tully Monster" that goes by the scientific name "Tullimonstrum gregarium" is the state fossil of Illinois and even graces the side of local UHauls.
According to Live Science, every effort by the scientists to classify the "Tully Monster" has failed so far. Some called it a worm, while others determined it to be a shell-less snail. An effort was also made to name it an "arthropod", the class to which lobsters, spiders and insects belong.
The first study of the "Tully Monster" was published in the journal "Nature" in March 2016. The researchers in the study looked at more than 1200 "Tully Monster" fossils and reported seeing a light band going down the creature's midline. This band was most likely a notochord, one kind of primitive backbone, said the scientists. Moreover, the fossils also consisted of remains of internal organs, such as gill sacs as in vertebrates. However, scientists later determined that the faint circles resembling gill slits weren't used for breathing. Also the placement of "a dark circle under the gills" or liver was not as it is in vertebrates' i.e. behind the pharynx.
As per the scientists, this type of "misassignment" affects the understanding of vertebrate evolution and vertebrate diversity at the same time. The outlying characteristic of the "Tully Monster" makes it harder for the scientists get at how things are changing in an ecosystem.
