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One of the first mammals to really thrive after the dinosaurs were wiped out should look familiar to Canadians.

Beaver-like creature ruled after dinosaurs perished


Daniel Martins
Digital Reporter

Monday, October 5, 2015, 12:48 PM - It was one of the first mammals to really thrive after the dinosaurs were wiped out, and it should look familiar to Canadians.

Minus the tail, Kimbetopsalis simmonsae bears more than a passing resemblance to a certain industrious dam builder that is a national symbol of the country.

"We could think of Kimbetopsalis as a primeval beaver, which lived only a few hundred thousand years after the asteroid impact that killed the dinosaurs," Dr. Steve Brusatte, one of the researchers who described the animal, said in a release from the University of Edinburgh. "The asteroid caused apocalyptic environmental change, but it seems like mammals began to recover pretty quickly afterwards."

Credit: Sarah Shelley/University of Edinburgh

In fact, the beaver-like creature -- not actually a rodent, but a member of an extinct species known as multituberculates -- shared the planet with the dinosaurs for 100 million years, but once the giant reptiles were no more, they really thrived, surviving until around 35 million years ago when they were eclipsed by true rodents.

The new fossil, discovered in New Mexico, dates back to half a million years after the meteor impact that sealed the dinosaurs' fate. From its teeth, the researchers could tell that it was a herbivore, and that may have been the a major factor in its survival of the impact, and its success compared to other mammals.

Credit: Tom Williamson/University of Edinburgh

"It may be because they were among the few mammals that were already well-suited to eating plants when the extinction came," Dr. Thomas Williamson, of the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science, said in a release. "This new species helps to show just how fast they were evolving to take advantage of conditions in the post-extinction world."

The research was published in the latest issue of the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society.

SOURCES: Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society | University of Edinburgh | University of Nebraska-Lincoln

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