我们对神秘的“塔利怪兽”的了解

我们对神秘的“塔利怪兽”的了解

Ever since its 300-million-year-old fossils were first unearthed in 1958, the alien-like "Tully Monster" has defied classification.

自从它的三亿年前的化石于1958年首次出土以来，这只长相酷似外星人的“塔利怪物”就一直没有被归类。

This bizarre creature featured a narrow, trunk-like neck that extended from its head, with a mouth at the end filled with razor-sharp teeth. Its eyes sat further back on the body at the ends of a rigid bar perched on its back, and it swam using cuttlefish-like fins at the tail section.

这种奇怪的生物有一个从头部延伸出来的狭窄的，像树干一样的脖子，在它的末端有一个充满锋利牙齿的嘴巴。它的眼睛向后靠在身体后面，在背部一根坚硬的杆的末端，它在尾部用墨鱼一样的鳍游动。

A reconstruction of the so-called 'Tully Monster,' which also happens to be the state fossil of Illinois. (Photo: Dotted Yeti/Shutterstock)

Needless to say, it looked more like a chimera or hoax than any sort of real creature. It was unlike anything else ever found on Earth.

不用说，它看起来更像一个幻想或恶作剧，而不是任何一种真正的生物。它不像地球上发现的任何东西。

In April 2016, a Yale-led team of paleontologists said they had determined what this animal was, reports Phys.org.

据Phys.org报道，2016年4月，一个由耶鲁大学领导的古生物学家团队表示，他们已经确定了这种动物是什么。

It's a vertebrate, according to researchers, and its closest living relative is probably a lamprey. With painstaking, high-tech analysis of its fossils, the Yale team was able to establish that the Tully Monster had gills and a stiffened rod or notochord (basically, a rudimentary backbone) that supported its body.

根据研究人员的说法，它是一种脊椎动物，它现存的近亲可能是七鳃鳗。通过对它的化石进行细致、高科技的分析，耶鲁大学的研究小组得以确定，塔利巨兽有腮和一根支撑身体的加劲杆或脊索(基本上是基本的脊椎骨)。

"I was first intrigued by the mystery of the Tully Monster. With all of the exceptional fossils, we had a very clear picture of what it looked like, but no clear picture of what it was," said Victoria McCoy, lead author of the study published in the journal Nature.

“我第一次被神秘的塔利怪兽所吸引。研究报告的第一作者维多利亚·麦考伊在《自然》杂志上说:“我们对所有这些异常化石都有一个非常清晰的认识，但对它们究竟是什么却没有一个清晰的认识。”

"Basically, nobody knew what it was," added Derek Briggs, co-author of the study. "The fossils are not easy to interpret, and they vary quite a bit. Some people thought it might be this bizarre, swimming mollusk. We decided to throw every possible analytical technique at it."

“基本上，没人知道那是什么，”研究报告的合著者德里克·布里格斯补充道。“化石不容易解释，而且它们有很大的差异。有些人认为这可能是一种奇怪的会游泳的软体动物。我们决定使用一切可能的分析技术。”

Another study, also published in the journal Nature, showed that the monster's eyes had melanosomes, which make and store melanin. Those structures are typical of vertebrates, according to the researchers, giving that theory more credence.

另一项同样发表在《自然》杂志上的研究表明，这种怪物的眼睛有黑素体，可以制造和储存黑色素。研究人员称，这些结构是脊椎动物的典型特征，这使该理论更加可信。

Or maybe it doesn't have a spine

或者它可能没有脊椎

A artist's concept of a group of Tully Monsters swimming in the ocean. (Photo: Dotted Yeti/Shutterstock)

However, about a year later, a different team of researchers said there was no spine there after all. In their study, published in the journal Paleontology, they said the Tully Monster was likely an invertebrate.

然而，大约一年后，另一组研究人员说，它根本没有脊椎。在他们发表在《古生物学》杂志上的研究中，他们说塔利巨兽很可能是一种无脊椎动物。

Sallan and her team said the studies failed to definitively classify the creature as a vertebrate.

Sallan和她的团队说，这些研究并没有明确地将这种生物归类为脊椎动物。

So how do we identify the creature?

那么我们如何识别这种生物呢?

A Tully Monster fossil, showing its proboscis and eye bar or stalks, found in the Mazon Creek fossil area of Illinois. (Photo: Kimberly Boyles/Shutterstock)

The technology that may make the identification of the Tully Monster possible is a method known as synchrotron elemental mapping, which illuminates an animal's physical features by mapping the chemistry within a fossil.

同步加速器元素绘图技术可能会使确认塔利怪物成为可能。同步加速器元素绘图技术通过绘制化石内部的化学成分来阐明动物的物理特征。

Thousands of Tully Monster fossils have been found, but all of them have been unearthed at a single site: coal mining pits in northeastern Illinois. So as far as researchers know, these animals could have been distinct to a specific habitat. They were named after their initial discoverer, Francis Tully, and their official scientific designation is Tullimonstrum gregarium.

成千上万的塔利怪物化石已经被发现，但它们都是在一个地方出土的:伊利诺斯州东北部的煤矿。因此，据研究人员所知，这些动物可能与特定的栖息地截然不同。它们是以最初的发现者弗朗西斯·塔利的名字命名的，他们的官方科学名称是塔利蒙斯·格里瑞姆。

The creatures are so unfamiliar that they're pretty terrifying, and those teeth certainly don't help, but the largest Tully Monster ever found only measures about a foot long. That means that if they were alive today, humans probably wouldn't be on their menu. It's difficult to say much of anything about their behavior, though.

这些生物是如此的陌生，以至于它们非常可怕，而且这些牙齿当然没有帮助，但迄今为止发现的最大的塔利怪物只有一英尺长。这意味着，如果它们今天还活着，人类可能不会出现在它们的菜单上。然而，我们很难对它们的行为做出评价。

"It's so different from its modern relatives that we don't know much about how it lived," McCoy said. "It has big eyes and lots of teeth, so it was probably a predator."

McCoy说:“它和它的现代亲戚非常不同，我们不太了解它是如何生活的。它有大眼睛和很多牙齿，所以它可能是掠食者。”