Date: January 22, 2019
Source: University of Otago
An Otago
researcher has added another piece to the puzzle of the evolution of modern
baleen whales with a world-first study examining the teeth and enamel of baleen
whales' ancestors.
Modern
baleen whales have no teeth when adults, instead they use large keratin plates
called baleen to filter prey from large volumes of seawater. However, millions
of years ago their ancestors had teeth as most mammals do.
Lead
author of the research just published in the Journal of Mammalian
Evolution, Dr Carolina Loch from the Faculty of Dentistry, explains scientists
are still trying to understand how and why this process happened. The research
she carried out together with colleagues from the National Scientific and Technical
Research Council in Argentina, CONICET, and the Swedish Museum of Natural
History has provided more information.
They
studied details of the inside structure of the teeth of two fossil whales from
around 35 million years ago. These teeth were collected in Antarctica by the
Argentinian and Swedish study co-authors Monica Buono and Thomas Mörs. Because
teeth are naturally heavily mineralised, they preserve well in the fossil
record and can provide clues of how extinct animals lived.
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