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Predator pemburu punah yang berukuran anak kucing ditemukan
Extinct kitten-sized hunter discovered
Date:
May 8, 2014
Source:
Case Western Reserve University
Summary:
Researchers have discovered an ancient kitten-sized
predator that lived in Bolivia about 13 million years ago -- one of the
smallest species reported in the extinct order Sparassodonta. The species has
the features of a tenacious hunter that could feed on animals its own size, the
scientists say.
.................
A Case Western Reserve University student and his mentor
have discovered an ancient kitten-sized predator that lived in Bolivia about 13
million years ago -- one of the smallest species reported in the extinct order
Sparassodonta.
Third-year
undergraduate student Russell Engelman and Case Western Reserve anatomy
professor Darin Croft made the finding by analyzing a partial skull that had
been in a University of Florida collection more than three decades.
The
researchers report their finding in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.
"The
animal would have been about the size of a marten, a catlike weasel found in
the Northeastern United States and Canada, and probably filled the same
ecological niche," said Engelman, an evolutionary biology major from
Russell Township, Ohio.
The
researchers refrained from naming the new species mainly because the specimen
lacks well-preserved teeth, which are the only parts preserved in many of its
close relatives.
The skull,
which would have been a little less than 3 inches long if complete, shows the
animal had a very short snout. A socket, or alveolus, in the upper jaw shows it
had large, canines, that were round in cross-section much like those of a
meat-eating marsupial, called the spotted-tailed quoll, found in Australia
today, the researchers said.
Although
sparassodonts are more closely related to modern opossums than cats and dogs,
the group included saber-toothed species that fed on large prey. This small
Bolivian species probably fed on the ancient relatives of today's guinea pigs
and spiny rats, the researchers said.
"Most
predators don't go after animals of equal size, but these features indicate
this small predator was a formidable hunter," Croft said.
The specimen
had not been studied in detail after being collected. It was provisionally
identified as belonging to a particular group of extinct meat-eating opossums,
due in part to its small size. Further adding to the identity challenge, almost
all small sparassodonts have been identified by their teeth and lower jaws,
which this skull lacks.
Croft wanted
to study the skull because its age is nearly twice that of the oldest known
species of meat-eating opossum. The specimen was found in a mountainous site
known as Quebrada Honda, Bolivia, in 1978, in rock layers dated 12 million to
13 million years ago.
Structurally,
extinct meat-eating opossums and sparassodont skulls share a number of
similarities due to their similar meat-eating diet, Engelman said.
"No
single feature found in the skull was so distinctive that we could say one way
or the other what it was," Croft said, "but the combination of
features is unique and says this is a sparassodont."
One key was
that a particular bone of the orbit, the boney socket of the eye, does not
touch the nasal bone in an opossum but does in a sparassodont.
The short
snout was a kind of red herring. While jaguar-sized sparassodonts had them, the
smaller members of the order had fox-like faces. And this species was smaller
than most of those.
These
smaller sparassodonts also have gaps between their teeth that are absent in
most larger species. The skull shows no gaps.
Overall, the
animal's features are a mixture of those found in different species of
sparassodonts, but are not characteristic of in any one subgroup within the
order. That puts this species near the bottom of the family tree, the
researchers said.
Croft, who regularly
collects from the same site where the skull was found, will return there this
summer to gather evidence he hopes will show whether this species lived in an
open grassland, forest or mixed habitat.
He also
hopes to find the lower jaw, which may enable direct comparisons with known
species and provide enough foundation to name the animal.
Story
Source:
The above
story is based on materials provided by Case Western Reserve University. Note: Materials
may be edited for content and length.
Journal
Reference:
- Russell K. Engelman, Darin A. Croft. A new species of small-bodied sparassodont (Mammalia, Metatheria) from the middle Miocene locality of Quebrada Honda, Bolivia. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, 2014; 34 (3): 672 DOI: 10.1080/02724634.2013.827118
Cite This
Page:
Case Western Reserve University.
"Extinct kitten-sized hunter discovered." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily,
8 May 2014. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/05/140508172227.htm>.
