New Coelacanth Species Discovered in Texas
At just over a foot long, new fish was smaller than its kin, study says.
One of the world's oldest types of fish, coelacanths (pronounced SEE-la-kanths) are primitive, slow-moving fish that had been thought extinct until an individual was found off Africa in 1938. There are now over 40 known coelacanth species. The two that live today are called living fossils because they have remained virtually unchanged for 320 million years.
The newfound coelacanth has been dubbed Reidus hilli in honor of its discoverer Robert Reid, an artist who found the fish's fossilized skull near his home in Forth Worth, Texas, in the late 1980s.
Reid donated the skull to nearby Southern Methodist University, where scientists quickly identified it based on unique bones, called gular plates, on the underside of its jaw.
"Almost from the get-go, we
