Image: Reconstruction by Jorge Gonzalez, copyright Guillermo W. Rougier
A molelike mammal nicknamed the "grave robber" survived the event that killed the dinosaurs, new research finds.
Necrolestes patagonensis, whose name translates in part to "grave robber," was among the mammals that lived through the dinosaur mass extinction. The new study finds that the creature lived 45 million years longer than paleontologists realized.
Necrolestes was first discovered in fossil form in the Patagonia region of South America in 1891, but little was known about the animal, study researcher John Wible, a mammalogist at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, said in a statement.
"Necrolestes is one of those animals in the textbooks that would appear with a picture and a footnote, and the footnote would say 'we don't know what it is,'" Wible said.
For a century, researchers at different institutions gave Necrolestes their best shot, trying to place it accurately onto the mammal family tree. No one could agree. In stepped Wible and his team, including the University of Louisville's Guillermo Rougier.
"This project was a little daunting, because we had to contradict 100 years of interpretation," Rougier said in a statement.
Part of the confusion involved the animal's mismatched features, which included an upturned snout, compact body, and short, wide legs. All researchers could tell was that its body would have been perfect for digging. Triangular teeth suggested a diet of worms and other squirmy underground creepy-crawlies. [25 Amazing Ancient Beasts]
In 2011, however, Rougier and his colleagues discovered a new South American extinct mammal, part of a now-extinct group that lived in the Late Cretaceous and early Paleocene, about 100 million years ago. The new fossil bore many similarities to the mysterious Necrolestes, including molars with just one root anchoring them to the jaw.
The find cements that both the new and old fossils are Necrolestes and proves that this group did not go extinct as early as believed. Paleontologists call discoveries like this "the Lazarus effect," after the Biblical character who came back from the dead. Once thought to have died with the dinosaurs, Necrolestes is now known to have survived 45 million years longer than its relatives, which mostly perished when the dinosaurs died.
Necrolestes' subterranean lifestyle may explain its lucky fate, the researchers reported Monday (Nov. 19) in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"There's no other mammal in the Tertiary of South America that even approaches its ability to dig, tunnel, and live in the ground," Wible said. "It must have been on the edges, in an ecological niche that allowed it to survive."
- Wipe Out: History's Most Mysterious Extinctions
- Paleo-Art: Dinosaurs Come to Life in Stunning Illustrations
- 6 Strange Species Discovered in Museums
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7 Comments
Add CommentI guess this means that man evolved from these moles.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThese nasty beasts, along with the moles in my back yard, might never have even noticed that the surface above was burning or being drenched in acid rain...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUm, NO! The THEORY of evilution says that man is descended from monkeys instead of created in god's perfect image from spit and dirt. Duh! Leave the fantasies with the socialist scientists where they belong!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this(Note: before someone responds, I respectfully ask that they Google "Poe's Law" to ensure they're responding properly.)
*Descended from a common ancestor shared with monkeys and other primates to be specific.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this...or vague.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe timeline in this article had me thoroughly confused, and I had to do some research. FYI:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNecrolestes is an Early Miocene animal (maybe 20 million years ago) which has been known for a long time, but with uncertain affiliations with existing mammal groups. Rougier, et al did not in fact discover any fossils themselves, but they analyzed some nontherian fossils that have been recently discovered by others and re-examined the Necrolestes fossils, showing that Necrolestes belongs in this group. The newer fossils are Late Cretaceous - Paleocene, which is 65 million years or so. The 100 mya number in the article has nothing to do with the research as far as I can tell, and seems to be an error.
You may be entirely correct, but the article states:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"... discovered a new South American extinct mammal, part of a now-extinct group that lived in the Late Cretaceous and early Paleocene, about 100 million years ago."
As I read it, the new mammal was a member of a now extinct group. That extinct group lived during Late Cretaceous epoch, which began 100 Mya...
If this reading is correct the 100 Mya timeframe might have essentially nothing to do with the new mammal - only its associated group, making its mention more confusing than informative...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_Cretaceous
"The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma)..."