7 Major "Missing Links" Since Darwin

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Tiktaalik: The "Fishapod"

Discovered in Arctic Canada in 2004, 375 million-year-old Tiktaalik had not only gills and scales but traits of a tetrapod (four-legged land animal), including limblike fins, ribs, a flexible neck, and a croc-shaped head.

Archaeopteryx: The First Bird

First found in Germany in 1861, the 150- to 145-million-year-old Archaeopteryx fossils bear impressions of flight feathers on their limbs and tails.

Amphistium: The Halfway Flatfish

Revealed in 2008, this 50-million-year-old fossil flatfish's eyes are not quite on opposite sides of its body but not quite in their modern asymmetrical arrangement, both on one side of the body (modern-flatfish picture). (See "Odd Fish Find Contradicts Intelligent-Design Argument" [July 9, 2008].)

Ambulocetus: The Walking Whale

Discovered in Pakistan in 1992, the fossil skeleton of 50-million-year-old Ambulocetus ("walking whale") suggests it was able to walk on four legs—on land and in the water.

Homo Ergaster:  The "Turkana Boy" Species

Homo ergaster (shown in a museum display) was a small-brained but tall human species with body proportions similar to our own. Known largely from a 1.6-million-year-old fossil of a child found in 1984 near Lake Turkana, Kenya, the species is often called simply Turkana Boy.

Hyracotherium/Eohippus: The Dawn Horse

Known today as Hyracotherium ("hyrax-like beast"), Eohippus ("dawn horse") was the original name of the first complete skeleton of this primitive, foxlike horse, discovered in the southern U.S. in 1867.

Thrinaxodon: The Emerging Mammal

Identified from fossils in South Africa and Antarctica, this archaic proto-mammal emerged on a reptile-ruled Earth some 245 million years ago.

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