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Fossil indicates hairy, squirrel-sized creature was not quite a mammal

By Guest PostAugust 8, 2013Nature, Scienceancient mammalian relative, april isch, armadillo like gait, China, daohugou fossil site, evolutionary adaptations, extinction, feathered dinosaur, fossil, Germany, inner mongolia, jurassic era, jurassic fossil, liaoning, mammal, mammal like reptiles, megaconus mammaliaformis, non mammalian characteristics, northeast of beijing, paleontological museum, placental mammals, pre mammalian fossil, proto mammal, squirrel sized creature, triassic jurassic transition, type of locomotion, tyrannosaurus rex, university of bonn, university of chicago, zhe xi luo

165 million-year-old omnivore may have had armadillo-like gait

A newly discovered fossil reveals the evolutionary adaptations of a 165 million-year-old proto-mammal, providing evidence that traits such as hair and fur originated well before the rise of the first true mammals. UChicago scientists described the biological features of this ancient mammalian relative, named Megaconus mammaliaformis, in the Aug. 8 issue of Nature.

“We finally have a glimpse of what may be the ancestral condition of all mammals, by looking at what is preserved in Megaconus. It allows us to piece together poorly understood details of the critical transition of modern mammals from pre-mammalian ancestors,” said Zhe-Xi Luo, professor of organismal biology and anatomy. (more…)

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Fossil indicates hairy, squirrel-sized creature was not quite a mammal