Five-eyed fossil shrimp is evolutionary 'missing link'

A fossil specimen of Kylinxia zhangi taken in 2019 in Yunnan, China. - NANJING INSTITUTE OF GEOLOGY AND PALAEONTOLOGY

TOKYO (AFP): The discovery of a five-eyed shrimp-like creature that lived about 520 million years ago may end a long-running debate about the evolution of Earth's most common animals.

Arthropods, ranging from lobsters and crabs to spiders and millipedes, make up around 80 percent of all animal species alive today and are characterised by their hard exoskeleton.