✅Prior to the study, fossil records of Nautilus in the Philippines from Tambac Island in Pangasinan (Wani et al., 2008) and Leyte (de Ocampo, 2013) were found to be not older than early Pleistocene.

✅ The 2012 and 2018 fieldwork of researchers from the UP NIGS Nannoworks Laboratory and the National Museum of the Philippines in the Calatagan Marl or Calatagan Formation led to the discovery of two nautilid fossil specimens.

✅ The Calatagan Formation was dated as late Miocene-early Pliocene based on planktonic foraminifera.

✅ Apart from the nautilid fossils, the excavation site also contained foraminiferan, mollusk and echinoid fossils and coral fragments.

✅ Aside from being the oldest fossil record of Nautilus in the country, the fossil samples obtained are also the only late Miocene-early Pliocene fossil record of the species in the world.

✅ The study further debunks the previous notion that nautilids do not have any fossil record during the Pliocene and Pleistocene. Earlier evidence on this was presented by the 1880 discovery of Nautilus javanus in Java, Indonesia which was believed to date back from the late Miocene.