The first animal to appear on Earth has been identified by scientists. It was a strange jellyfish-like creature called a ctenophore - popular in modern aquariums.
All species evolved from the single common ancestor that lived up to 700 million years ago including sponges, insects, sharks - and us. Co-author Professor Daniel Rokhsar, of California University in Berkeley, said: "The most recent common ancestor of all animals probably lived 600 or 700 million years ago.
"It's hard to know what they were like because they were soft-bodied animals and didn't leave a direct fossil record. But we can use comparisons across living animals to learn about our common ancestors.
