New technology used to study old spider

MANCHESTER, England, Oct. 30 (UPI) -- British-led researchers say they used cutting-edge technology to view a 50-million-year-old fossilized spider in three-dimensional detail.

David Penney at Manchester University and colleagues at Ghent University in Belgium said they used a technique called "Very High Resolution X-Ray Computed Tomography," or VHR-CT, to digitally dissect the tiny fossil and reveal the preservation of internal organs.

The male spider is from a new species named Cenotextricella simoni. Penney said it is approximately 53-million years old and was found preserved in amber in an area of France known as the Paris Basin.

The research marked the first time VHR-CT has been used to digitally dissect a fossil in amber – being originally developed for medical diagnostic purposes.

"This technique essentially generates full 3-D reconstructions of minute fossils and permits digital dissection of the specimen to reveal the preservation of internal organs," said Penney. "This is definitely the way forward for the study of amber fossils."

Penney said amber provides a unique window into past ecosystems, retaining an incredible amount of information about the environment in a fossilized specimen.

The research is detailed in the Zootaxa Journal.