This article was taken from the February 2013 issue of Wired magazine. Be the first to read Wired's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by <span class="s1">subscribing online.
This glass sponge has been living in the South China Sea for about 11,000 years. Discovered by molecular biologist Werner Muller from the University Medical Centre of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz in Germany, and a team of researchers, the Monorhaphis chuni sponge "is the oldest living animal, having evolved 700 million years ago," says Muller.
The creature is two metres long, weighs 10kg and has a skeleton of silica spicules, spikes that give structural support and are as pure as quartz. While trying to date the sponge, Muller's team analysed ratios of manganese, calcium and oxygen inside it. Their analyses showed that the sea temperature in the first 1,000 years of the sponge's life remained constant. The temperature then increased from about two degrees Celsius to as high as ten degrees Celsius, before dropping to today's four degrees Celsius. The sponge is one of the only natural archives of the sea's changing temperature.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
