article_snippet: Scientists believe the sponge – which represents the most primitive animal on Earth - is the oldest ever found.
article_snippet: A 'nearly pristine' 600 million-year-old sponge discovery pushes back the start of the evolution of multicellular animals to before  Cambrian explosion.
article_snippet: Scientists believe the sponge – which represents the most primitive creature on Earth - is the oldest ever found .  
article_snippet: Its discovery pushes back the date of multicellular animal evolution to 60 million years before  Cambrian explosion.
article_snippet: The latest finding would place the sponge around 60 million years before the Cambrian started.
article_snippet: The sponge, found in the Doushantuo Formation in southern China (left), suggests the date of multicellular animal evolution was 60 million years before the Cambrian explosion started. 
article_snippet: Discovery of additional specimens would confirm that the fossil represents a Precambrian sponge,' Lead author Maoyan Zhu said. '
article_snippet: But features of the fossil are consistent with sponge anatomy… fossils of similarly advanced eumetazoans [all major animal groups except sponges] may yet lie in the fossil record.'
highlights_snippet: The sponge suggests multi-cellular evolution took place before Cambrian explosion .
   