Project 3108: I. Casanovas-Vilar, J. Garcia-Porta, J. Fortuny, O. Sanisidro, J. Prieto, M. Querejeta, S. Llacer, J. M. Robles, F. Bernardini, D. M. Alba. 2018. Oldest skeleton of a fossil flying squirrel casts new light on the phylogeny of the group. eLife. 7:e39270.
Specimen: † Miopetaurista neogrivensis
View: 3D skeleton

Abstract

Flying squirrels are the only group of gliding mammals with a remarkable diversity and wide geographical range. However, their evolutionary story is not well known. Thus far, identification of extinct flying squirrels has been exclusively based on dental features, which, contrary to certain postcranial characters, are not unique to them. Therefore, fossils attributed to this clade may indeed belong to other squirrel groups. Here we report the oldest fossil skeleton of a flying squirrel (11.6 Ma) that displays the gliding-related diagnostic features shared by extant forms and allows for a recalibration of the divergence time between tree and flying squirrels. Our phylogenetic analyses combining morphological and molecular data generally support older dates than previous molecular estimates (~23 Ma), being congruent with the inclusion of some of the earliest fossils (~36 Ma) into this clade. They also show that flying squirrels experienced little morphological change for almost 12 million years.


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Article DOI: 10.7554/eLife.39270

Project DOI: 10.7934/P3108, http://dx.doi.org/10.7934/P3108
This project contains
  • 8 Media
  • 4 Taxa
  • 4 Specimens
Total size of project's media files: 906.14M

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    Authors' Institutions

    • Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle, Paris (Natural History Museum, Paris)

    • Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet Muenchen

    • University of Kansas

    • Bayerische Staatssammlung fuer Palaeontologie und Geologie

    • Bavarian State Collection of Zoology

    • Museo Storico della Fisica e Centro Studi e Ricerche Enrico Fermi

    • Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP)

    • Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona



    Members

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    Josep Fortuny
    Project Administrator
    447


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