College student David Fillmore made a wild discovery while studying a sandstone rock in a museum in Reading, Pennsylvania, two years ago. He found the full-body imprints of three ancient amphibians.
The 330-million-year-old impressions had been collected decades earlier, but sat unnoticed in the museum. The impressions are of foot-long salamander-like creatures called Temnospondyli (tem-no-spon-dul-eye). Spencer G. Lucas, of the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science, presented the discovery last week at a meeting of scientists.
Scientists say the amphibians lived long before dinosaurs. Full-body impressions are especially rare. Unlike fossil bones, the imprints reveal more details about texture.
"They're giving us new information about the anatomy of these long-extinct animals," says Lucas.