Thursday, April 27, 2006

Selected News Feeds - 'Banana-jawed' Fossil Mammal Linked To Rare Sound-producing Skill

Paleontologists at the Duke Lemur Center have assembled a new picture of a 35-million-year-old fossil mammal -- and they even have added a hint of sound. By painstakingly measuring hundreds of specimens of a fossil mammal called Thyrohyrax, recovered from the famous fossil beds of Egypt's Fayum Province, the researchers determined that males of this now-extinct species -- and only males -- had oversized, swollen lower jaws shaped much like a banana. Further, the team speculated, the animals may have used the balloonlike structural chamber that shaped their bizarre jaws to produce sound.

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