Scientists have discovered the fossil remains of an ancient marine reptile in the act of being born.
The fossil shows that the little icthyosaur was just starting to swim headfirst out of its mother’s body at the time of its death, with two other icthyosaur embryos still awaiting their own birth experience.
The rare fossil was discovered in what was once an inland sea that split China in two. Today, the site lies 150 miles east of Shanghai in the Anhui province. Scientists believe the embryos and their mother were buried in a landslide.
Ryosuke Motani, a paleobiologist at the University of California, Davis, and his colleagues from Peking University and the Anhui Geological Museum have been working at the site for three years. In that time they have uncovered 80 new icthyosaur skeletons that date back to the early Triassic period, roughly 248 million years ago.