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The Largest Early Mammal Relative Alive In The Jurassic Looked Like A Cross Between An Otter And A Platypus
The fact that it sits just outside true mammals, but already has evolved a complex soft palate, shows that this innovation was already in place when our own ancestors started to evolve. This may have allowed them to develop diverse ways of eating and exploit new environments. “Docodonts are the most speciose group of the stem mammals across North America, Europe, and China, and this is probably one of the two most complete specimens for the group,” said Zhe-Xi Luo, from the University of Chicago, in a statement. “This fossil shows that the intricate structures of the throat are starting to come together, long before modern mammals split off from their predecessors, and they are very important to the evolutionary innovation that underlies later adaptive radiation.” An alternative Jurassic Park Go back 165 million years and the landscape of Inner Mongolia would have looked vastly different. Freshwater rivers would have crossed through forests containing some of the earliest redwood trees, while long-snouted pterosaurs soared overhead. Among the ferns, small, feathered dinosaurs would have dashed, picking off the little reptiles and amphibians scuttling through the leaf litter. Walking along the banks of one of these rivers, there might have been the...
