A grazing Gomphotherium in Middle Miocene Central Asia, 10 million years prior to the origin of the Elephantidae

Scientific Reports
Yan WuShi-Qi Wang

Abstract

Feeding preference of fossil herbivorous mammals, concerning the coevolution of mammalian and floral ecosystems, has become of key research interest. In this paper, phytoliths in dental calculus from two gomphotheriid proboscideans of the middle Miocene Junggar Basin, Central Asia, have been identified, suggesting that Gomphotherium connexum was a mixed feeder, while the phytoliths from G. steinheimense indicates grazing preference. This is the earliest-known proboscidean with a predominantly grazing habit. These results are further confirmed by microwear and isotope analyses. Pollen record reveals an open steppic environment with few trees, indicating an early aridity phase in the Asian interior during the Mid-Miocene Climate Optimum, which might urge a diet remodeling of G. steinheimense. Morphological and cladistic analyses show that G. steinheimense comprises the sister taxon of tetralophodont gomphotheres, which were believed to be the general ancestral stock of derived "true elephantids"; whereas G. connexum represents a more conservative lineage in both feeding behavior and tooth morphology, which subsequently became completely extinct. Therefore, grazing by G. steinheimense may have acted as a behavior preadaptive for a...Continue Reading

References

Oct 1, 1990·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·R L CiochonR G Thompson
Dec 29, 2010·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·Amanda G HenryDolores R Piperno
Mar 23, 2011·Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society·John Damuth, Christine M Janis

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