Fossils challenge amphibian model for first land vertebrates (opens in new tab)

A study published Thursday, June 19, in Science reports that rare fossils from the Mazon Creek fossil beds in northern Illinois challenge the long-held idea that some of the earliest land-dwelling vertebrates developed like modern amphibians. Researchers from the Field Museum studied baby embolomeres, crocodile-like predators that lived in rivers, lakes and swamps between about 350 million and 280 million years ago, and found evidence that the juveniles lacked expected tadpole-like features s...