An amateur fish enthusiast recognised it at once as a Coelacanth, a fish thought to be extinct for 70 million years. Since then several have been caught, and this one is pride of place in the Central Hall. Today the prehistoric Coelacanth can be found in deep water around East Africa and Indonesia. It's a story of survival that astonished the scientific community. And one that shows you never know what's out there until you look, especially in the depths of the ocean, the world's last truly unexplored ecosystem. Mark Carwardine caught a boat from the west coast of Sweden in search of a species new to science. In 2003, the carcass of a stranded whale was sunk here by scientists looking at the importance of whale carcases to the ecology of the ocean floor.


一名业余鱼类爱好者当即认出这是一条矛尾鱼，之前被认为已灭绝了七千万年之久，此后人们陆续捕获数条矛尾鱼，如今这条鱼陈列在中央大厅的重要位置。如今，这种史前矛尾鱼在东非和印度尼西亚附近的深海中出现。这种鱼类尚未灭绝的消息，震惊了整个科学界。这件事说明，不去探索就永远不知道会找到什么，特别是在海洋深处。世界上最后一个未被探索的生态系统， 马克·卡沃丁登船从瑞典西海岸出发，搜寻新物种。2003年，科学家把一条鲸鱼的尸骸，沉入海底，用来观察研究鲸鱼尸骸对海底生态所起到的重要作用。