150-million-year-old marine fossil named after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy

KATOWICE, Poland — A 150-million-year-old marine invertebrate unearthed in Africa has been named after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The bizarre creature had 10 long arms and sharp tentacle-like claws for grasping the sea floor.

The animal named Ausichicrinites zelenskyyi, is closely related to starfish, sea cucumbers and sea urchins. It was a type of crinoid found today in abundance on rocky soils from the equator to the poles.

“The fossil is exceptionally well preserved,” lead author Professor Mariusz Salamon, from the University of Silesia in Poland, says in a statement to South West News Service. “Ausichicrinites zelenskyyi had 10 massive arms and a ring of claw-like appendages near the base for grasping the substrate.”

Salmon adds that the creature was named in honor of Zelensky “for his bravery and bravery in defending free Ukraine.”

Feather stars can have a variety of spectacular colors, from deep reds to bright oranges and electric yellows. Each arm can be up to a foot long. Their appendages are used to catch food and turn the animals into filter feeders. They sit in the water, baring their arms and letting the nutrients carried by the current come to them.

Feather stars also have the ability to shed an arm, as do some lizards their tails, which is also an anti-predator response.

“The specimen shows evidence of regeneration, confirming the hypothesis about the importance of predation in the evolution of feather stars,” says Salamon.

Ausichicrinites zelenskyyi was about two inches in diameter. His almost complete remains were excavated at a site in central western Ethiopia.

“Feather stars or komatulids are mostly known from highly disarticulated specimens,” the authors write in their article. “Here we report an almost complete and thus extremely rare komatulid from the Upper Jurassic of the Blue Nile Basin in central-western Ethiopia, which offers a unique insight into the morphology of komatulid arms and claws.”

The new fossil is believed to be the earliest example of feather star regeneration.

Feather stars, which are born with a stem that they shed in adulthood, can have as few as five arms and up to 200 arms. They are often conspicuous to divers and snorkelers. They are not poisonous to humans but can be poisonous to other animals.

Snails often live on them. Fish can comb through crinoids in search of a tasty meal.

Feather stars are echinoderms, like the more familiar sea stars. They are also a type of crinoid, along with crinoids that have a stem.

Ausichicrinites zelenskyyi is described in the Journal of the Royal Society open science.

Report by Mark Waghorn, author of the South West News Service.