Skull morphology of giant terror birds
Article Abstract:
An important new fossil of a gigantic avian skull was discovered from the middle Miocene of Patagonia (Comallo, Argentina), which has revealed significant differences between the skull of large and small phorusrhacids ('terror birds'). The analysis has concluded that reconstructions of the skull of gigantic phorusrhacids on the basis of their smaller relatives are unwarranted and the long-established correlation between their corpulence and that reduced cursorial agility should be re-evaluated.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 2006
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Speciation by hybridization in Heliconius butterflies
Article Abstract:
A study shows that a hybrid trait in an animal species can cause reproductive isolation. Heliconius butterflies, known to have intermediate morphology and a hybrid genome, is used to recreate its intermediate wing color and patterns crosses between three species after which mate preference experiments are used to show that the phenotype of H. heurippa reproductively isolates it from both parental species.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 2006
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Isolationist tendencies
Article Abstract:
The major faunal interchange ocurred in Afro-Arabian mammalian communities when a land bridge is formed between African-Arabian continents during late Oligocene. Fossil records of 27-million-year-old rocks in the Chilga region of the Ethiopian highlands are described in support of above fact.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 2003
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