A fossil of a squirrel-like furry creature, that could be our “great-great-grand uncle”, living about 165 million years ago, has been discovered in China.
The newly-discovered fossil reveals the evolutionary adaptations of the proto-mammal, providing evidence that traits such as hair and fur originated well before the rise of the first true mammals.
Scientists from the University of Chicago described the biological features of this ancient mammalian relative, named Megaconus mammaliaformis, in the journal Nature. “We finally have a glimpse of what may be the ancestral condition of all mammals, by looking at what is preserved in Megaconus. It allows us to piece together poorly understood details of the critical transition of modern mammals from pre-mammalian ancestors,” said Professor Zhe-Xi Luo. Discovered in Inner Mongolia, China, Megaconus is one of the best-preserved fossils of the mammaliaform groups, which are long-extinct relatives to modern mammals.
Megaconus co-existed with feathered dinosaurs in the Jurassic era, nearly 100 million years before Tyrannosaurus rex roamed Earth, researchers said.