PREHISTORIC FISH BRAIN

Now we are apprised
Of a fish brain fossilized.
Three hundred million years old,
Much better it is than gold
To scientists surprised.


The Roanoke Times, 3 March 2009:

Oldest fossilized brain found in fish from Midwest

"A 300 million-year-old fossilized brain has been discovered by researchers sudying a type of fish that once lived in what is now Kansas and Oklahoma."

"'Fossilized brains are unusual, and this is by far the oldest known example,' said John Maisey, curator in the division of paleontology at the American Museum of Natural History in New York."

"'Soft tissue has fossilized in the past, but it is usually muscle and organs like kidneys,' Maisey said in a statement."

"Maisey and co-authors report ... that the brain was discovered in a fossilized iniopterygian from Kansas, which they had sent for scanning at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility in Grenoble, France."

"Iniopterygians are extinct relatives of modern ratfishes, also known as ghost sharks."