A team of scientists said they have spotted a rare nautilus after more than 30 years. The species has been spotted 30 years after scientists for the first found and identified the new species of nautilus off the coast of Papua New Guinea.

The recently spotted species of nautilus, Allonautilus scrobiculatus, is cousin to squids and cuttlefish. They skim the sea floor in warm waters and have a distinctive spiral shell.

Peter Ward, a biologist at the University of Washington who spotted the species, said in a statement that in the case of Allonautilus, the spiral shell grows a strange furry, slimy material on it. This covering on the shell might help stay protected from predators' teeth and prevent other animals to get a grip.

Ward said he got this golden opportunity to see the Allonautilus when he and a group of colleagues set up bait several hundreds of feet below the surface. They even set a camera to track every moment for several days.

Two species of the elusive nautilus appeared until a sunfish came along to bully them away from the food.

Ward and colleague Bruce Saunders of Bryn Mawr College identified Allonautilus in 1984 and Saunders made another brief sighting in 1986, but it hasn't been recorded since.

Ward said the species is found only in this tiny island and could be the rarest animal in the world. During the July's expedition, a few of the creatures were caught and temporarily brought to the surface for study.

The nautilus is also a living fossil. Animals extremely similar to today's nautiluses can be found as far as 500 million years back into the fossil record. This means that they have seen the dinosaur's era.