4 ms·

Not having images in an article like this is just wrong. Here's an article about the paper that comes with some great images. https://www.earth.com/news/meet-m

• thangalin 2y ago
  I wrote a coffee table photobook that includes scientific illustrations of a mammals, starting from the emergence of the mammaliaform (~193 million years ago) to ancestral apes (~10 million years ago). The similarities between Mixodectes at 62 Ma, the shrew-like mammal at 66 Ma, and that early mammalian predecessor at 193 Ma are a fine example of how slow evolution can be when ecological niches are otherwise occupied. https://impacts.to/downloads/lowres/impacts.pdf https://impacts.to/downloads/lowres/impacts.pdf After the Chicxulub asteroid landed, it left us with an enigma: Why didn't reptiles rise again to fill those niches? PBS Eons has a video exploring the theory and the impacts of fungi on natural selection in the asteroid's wake. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPXbSx17030 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPXbSx17030
• travisgriggs 2y ago
  Squirrel!!
  • adrian_b 2y ago
    All early arboreal mammals looked like squirrels. However the true squirrels are somewhat more distantly related to us, the tree shrews (Tupaia) are more closely related to us and the mammal described in the parent article is even closer to us in the line of evolution that has generated our ancestors (and the ancestors of apes, monkeys, lemurs and colugos).