(Inside Science) — A newfound fossil that scientists described as perplexing, beautiful and the platypus of the crab family is now shedding light on how its crustacean relatives evolved, a new study finds.

Paleontologists examined more than 70 exceptionally well-preserved specimens of the entirely new branch of the crab evolutionary tree, along with hundreds of fossils of shrimp and other kinds of crustaceans, from deposits in Colombia and the United States that are 90 million to 95 mill