For the first time, scientists have measured how quickly large-scale evolutionary changes in body size occur. Intriguingly, while it takes 24 million generations for a mouse-sized animal to evolve to the size of an elephant, shrinkage is a much more rapid process. The findings, which focus on increases and decreases in mammal size following the […]
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Oxygen Increase Behind Rise Of Mammals
Researchers measuring levels of carbon 13 – a byproduct of photosynthesis – in deep-sea core samples going back 205 million years have identified a sharp rise in oxygen levels about 50 million years ago. The increase in oxygen levels gave mammals the evolutionary boost they needed to dominate the planet, says researcher Paul Falkowski, from […]