About 2 million years ago, in lowland tropical forests of what is now China, lived an ancestor of the giant panda that was very similar to the famed vegetarian bear except about half the size, scientists said.
Writing on Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the scientists described a complete skull and teeth of a pygmy-sized panda, shedding light on the origins of this unique, bamboo-munching bear.
The skull is about 60 percent of the size of a modern giant panda's and it has similar anatomical features, suggesting a similar lifestyle, they said.
Photo: AFP
The extinct bear, named Ailuropoda microta, is the earliest known member of the panda lineage, said Russell Ciochon, a University of Iowa anthropologist and one of the researchers.
"It's basically a miniaturized version of the living panda," Ciochon said in a telephone interview.
"Before, we only had teeth of this pygmy giant panda, just some isolated teeth. So we knew it existed, but we had no idea what the skull was like," he said.
"This skull is well-preserved, and has all its teeth intact, and on the basis of this fossil we can say that this bear was a miniaturized version of the modern panda," Ciochon said.
"This shows that the panda lineage has evolved over many millions of years separate from all the other species in the family of bears," he said.
The giant panda is considered the most specialized of any of the eight species of bears alive today. It is a carnivore that lost its hankering for meat and evolved into a committed vegetarian, scientists said.
The skull indicates the panda lineage has been evolving for millions of years completely separated from other bears. While some other bears will eat berries and other vegetation, the panda is the only fully vegetarian one.
Although it is one of the most recognizable animals on the planet, the giant panda is endangered, teetering on the edge of extinction mostly due to habitat loss and encroachment from people. They live in a few upland bamboo forests of China, isolated in rugged mountainous terrain.
It is estimated there are about 1,600 left in the wild.
The pygmy panda was about 1m long, compared to the modern giant panda at up to 2m long.
The creature lived in a moist, lowland tropical forest habitat that had bamboo as a dominant plant, the researchers said. It lived alongside two remarkable extinct creatures: the elephant-like Stegodon and the largest ape ever, Gigantopithecus, 3m tall and weighing up to 450kg.
The researchers believe the ancient panda ate bamboo shoots based on wear patterns on the teeth and specialized muscle markings on the skull that are evidence of heavy chewing. The evolution of this dietary specialization likely took millions of years to perfect, they said.
Bears appeared in the Miocene Epoch, which ran from about 25 million years ago to 5.5 million years ago.
The fossilized skull was found by Chinese researchers Jin Changzhu and Liu Jinyi in a limestone cave in southern China in 2001.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
‘DELUSIONAL’: Targeting the families of Hamas’ leaders would not push the group to change its position or to give up its demands for Palestinians, Ismail Haniyeh said Israeli aircraft on Wednesday killed three sons of Hamas’ top political leader in the Gaza Strip, striking high-stakes targets at a time when Israel is holding delicate ceasefire negotiations with the militant group. Hamas said four of the leader’s grandchildren were also killed. Ismail Haniyeh’s sons are among the highest-profile figures to be killed in the war so far. Israel said they were Hamas operatives, and Haniyeh accused Israel of acting in “the spirit of revenge and murder.” The deaths threatened to strain the internationally mediated ceasefire talks, which appeared to gain steam in recent days even as the sides remain far
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of