Background Essay: Ted Daeschler and Neil Shubin: Early Tetrapod Fossils

Paleontologists Ted Daeschler and Neil Shubin describe their fossil finds of aquatic, early limbed animals: Hynerpeton with its powerful forelimbs; the thick-jawed Densignathus rowei; Sauripterus with its muscular fin about the size of a tennis racket head; and the very large and ferocious lobe-fin fish Hyneria. Excerpted from an interview filmed for Evolution: "Great Transformations."