Taiwan's gift to the world
Article Abstract:
A new analysis of Austronesian languages may assist in reinterpreting the histories of other language families. It has been established that the around 1,200 languages of the Austronesian language family are split into 10 subgroups, of which nine are spoken only by the non-Chinese aborigines of the island of Taiwan. The 10th subgroup is made up of all 1,174 Austronesian languages outside Taiwan. It appears that the early diversification of existing Austronesian languages must have occurred a long time ago, on Taiwan. Only one group of Taiwanese emigrated to other islands, with their descendants in turn emigrating to other islands.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 2000
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Dirty eating for healthy living
Article Abstract:
Geophagy in Peruvian Amazon rainforest parrots is not driven by the need to obtain grit with which to grind food in the gizzard, as the soil preferred by these parrots is extremely fine. Geophagy in these birds is also not linked with the need to obtain essential minerals, as the soil they ingest has lower available quantities of most biologically important minerals than the soil they reject. These parrots use geophagy because they often eat seeds and unripe fruits which are bitter because they contain alkaloids and other toxins. Many of these chemicals bind to clay minerals containing negatively charged cation-exchange sites.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1999
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Twilight of the pygmy hippos
Article Abstract:
Human hunting probably caused the extinction of pygmy hippos on Cyprus but not on Madagascar. Paleontologists dispute whether the disappearance of many mammal species in the late Quaternary resulted from predation by humans or from climatic change. This dispute includes the pygmy hippos, pygmy elephants and other miniaturized fauna that evolved on Mediterranean and western Indian Ocean islands. However, new evidence indicates that humans hunted the hippos extensively on Cyprus but to a much lesser degree on Madagascar whose human settlers were less inclined to rely on hunting for food.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1992
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