65M YEAR BONK

Slime fossil sex
By Donna Watson

SCIENTISTS in India say they have discovered two fossils fused together in sexual union for 65 million years.

It is the first time copulation has been discovered in a fossil state.

But voyeurs will need a microscope to view the eternal lovers.

The fossils are tiny swarm cells, a stage in the development of the fungus myxomycetes, also known as slime moulds.

Coloured yellow, orange or red, the moulds live in cool, shady, moist places.

The cells are smaller than the width of a human hair.

The cells reproduce by "fusing," Ranjeet Kar, of the Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany in Lucknow, said.

Once the cells fuse, long, threadlike appendages known as flagella are lost, he said.

Finding the fossils in a fused position and with their flagella shed is evidence that the two cells were having sex, Kar said.

He went on: "The sexual organs being delicate and the time of conjugation short lived, it is rare to get this stage in the fossil state."

The cells were discovered in a 30-foot deep dry well in the state of Madhya Pradesh.

The findings were published in the October edition of the Indian journal Current Science.

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