Scientists have discovered and killed the world's oldest animal at 507 years old, CBS reported.
The ocean quahog known as "Ming" was found by a group of researchers working in Iceland in 2006. To calculate the creature's age, the scientists opened up the Artica islandica bivalve mollusk and counted its growth rings.
They were stunned when they thought the clam was 405 years old, the oldest living animal in the world not counting primitive metazoans, according to CBS. But scientists recently measured again to realize that they were off by more than a century.
"We got [the age] wrong the first time, and maybe we were a bit hasty publishing our findings back then," ocean scientist Paul Butler told ScienceNordic.
According to CBS, the clam could have gone on living if scientists had only counted the outside growth rings instead of opening it up to number the rings along the interior hinge ligament. The researchers opted to open the clam, believing they would get a more accurate count.
"On the outside, the mollusk shell is curved, and that makes it difficult to get the right angle for measuring and counting the growth rings," Butler said. "The growth rings are also better protected inside the hinge ligaments."
On the second count, scientists scrutinized the outside growth rings, which were less crowded than those inside.
"The age has been confirmed with a variety of methods, including geochemical methods such as the carbon-14 method. So I am very confident that they have now determined the right age. If there is any error, it can only be one or two years," said marine biologist Rob Witbaard of the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research. He was not involved in determining the updated age.
Named for the Chinese dynasty that ruled at the time it was born, the clam could shed new light on climate change as scientists study it further.
"There are a number of methods to chart past climate on land, but for the marine environment we only have some very limited data. The A. islandica can help fill this gap in our knowledge and provide us with a very accurate picture of past climate," Witbaard said.
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