When Stony Brook University anthropologist James Rossie began sifting through sediment inward the Tugen Hills of Republic of Kenya during his foremost solar daytime of the dig, he didn't know he'd respect teeth from a previously undiscovered tiny ape species.
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| Teeth of Simiolus minutus, which currently reside inward the National Museum of Kenya, Nairobi, were constitute inward the Tugen Hills of Republic of Kenya [Credit: Stony Brook University] |
The fossil molars were constitute at iii dissimilar sites along the Tugen Hills in addition to Lake Baringo Basin past times Rossie in addition to Hill inward 2004, only to a greater extent than than a decade earlier Hill's conk inward 2015. Rossie said fossil molars from the tiny ape, straight off housed inward the National Museum of Kenya, Nairobi, demonstrate bear witness of leafage eating, which suggests that it was inward straight contest with the earliest colobine monkeys for nutrient resources. Rossie said the small-scale ape is too the latest-surviving fellow member yet described of the small-scale apes that flourished inward the early on Miocene epoch.
At the offset of the Miocene epoch, at that topographic point were alone a few species of monkeys, acre apes were represented past times a wide radiations of species ranging from four to fifty kilograms; today, however, at that topographic point are alone a handful of ape species remaining. Precisely what caused the decrease inward ape multifariousness in addition to ascent of monkey multifariousness is a mystery that paleontologists accept been contemplating for decades, Rossie said, in addition to many suspect that straight contest betwixt the 2 groups was to blame.
"One affair this shows us is that only about apes were leaning toward folivory [leaf eating] at only the fourth dimension when monkeys were evolving their uniquely effective adaptations for it," said Rossie, . "Under those circumstances, I'm non surprised that this is the end yous come across of these small-scale apes. We've previously constitute the earliest colobine monkeys at these sites, in addition to straight off nosotros accept an ape that looks similar it would accept been inward straight contest with them for food."
Rossie, an associate professor of anthropology inward the College of Arts in addition to Sciences, said fossil molars from the tiny ape, straight off housed inward the National Museum of Kenya, Nairobi, demonstrate bear witness of leafage eating, which suggests that it was inward straight contest with the earliest colobine monkeys for nutrient resources. Rossie said the small-scale ape is too the latest-surviving fellow member yet described of the small-scale apes that flourished inward the early on Miocene epoch.
The greatest obstruction to solving this puzzle is the relative scarcity of fossil sites inward the middle of the transition, Rossie said – from close xiv to vi Ma. The novel species comes from sites inward the Tugen Hills that are with a small-scale number of African sites inward this fourth dimension range.
Source: Stony Brook University [November 07, 2018]
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