Hauffiopteryx altera (Latin for different from) has been identified as a new species of Ichthyosaurs by researchers from McGill University and the State Museum of Natural History Stuttgart in Germany.

Ichthyosaurs (‘fish lizards’), a group of tuna-shaped reptiles that inhabited Earth’s seas during the Mesozoic Era, were discovered by scientists in the early 19^th century. Similar to the modern-day dolphin, ichthyosaurs underwent profound adaptions to aquatic environments including limbs transformed into flippers, a dorsal fin, and a tail fin.

A fossilised insect wing discovered in an abandoned mine in Labrador has led palaeontologists from McGill University and the University of Gdańsk to identify a new hairy cicada species that lived around 100 million years ago.

Maculaferrum blaisi, described in a study published in Acta Palaeontologica Polonica, is the first hemipteran insect (true bug) to be discovered at the Redmond Formation, a fossil site from the Cretaceous period near Schefferville, Labrador.

The world’s oldest algae fossils are a billion years old, according to a new analysis by earth scientists at McGill University. Based on this finding, the researchers also estimate that the basis for photosynthesis in today’s plants was set in place 1.25 billion years ago.