Sussex spider web is oldest in the world (From The Argus)

Sussex spider web is oldest in the world

3:00pm Sunday 1st November 2009 in News By Andy Chiles

A spider web locked in a piece of amber in Sussex has been confirmed as the world's oldest fossil of its kind.

The prehistoric relic was found on a beach near Bexhill by brothers Jamie and Jonathan Hiscocks, a pair of amateur fossil hunters.

It has been estimated to be 140 million years old by scientists from Oxford University.

The experts believe it was created by an ancestor of the common garden spider.

Among the key findings, which have been published in the latest edition of the Journal of the Geological Society, was evidence of actinobacteria. Its discovery is expected to lead to new understandings of how soil has evolved.

The ground-breaking find is the latest in a series by the Hiscocks on beaches near their home in Bexhill.

Its discovery has echoed part of the plot of the 1993 blockbuster movie Jurassic Park, in which scientists recreate dinosaurs using genetic information taken from prehistoric flies trapped in amber.