ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2008
Stable isotope evidence for an amphibious phase in early proboscidean evolution.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2008. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 11 papers.
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11 citing papers in PubMed.
- Comparative study of the body proportions in Elephantidae and other large herbivorous mammals.Journal of anatomy · 2025Article
- Free Will as Defined by the Constrained Disorder Principle: a Restricted, Mandatory, Personalized, Regulated Process for Decision-Making.Integrative psychological & behavioral science · 2024Review
- Tooth marker of ecological abnormality: The interpretation of stress in extinct mega herbivores (proboscideans) of the Siwaliks of Pakistan.Ecology and evolution · 2022Article
- Olfaction of aquatic amniotes.Cell and tissue research · 2021Review
- Antioxidative Potency of Dolphin Serum Albumin Is Stronger Than That of Human Serum Albumin Irrespective of Substitution ofFrontiers in physiology · 2020Article
- Article
- Cranial remain from Tunisia provides new clues for the origin and evolution of Sirenia (Mammalia, Afrotheria) in Africa.PloS one · 2013Article
- Diversity in the later Paleogene proboscidean radiation: a small barytheriid from the Oligocene of Dhofar Governorate, Sultanate of Oman.Die Naturwissenschaften · 2012Article
- Molecules, morphology, and ecology indicate a recent, amphibious ancestry for echidnas.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2009Article
- Genetic variation at hair length candidate genes in elephants and the extinct woolly mammoth.BMC evolutionary biology · 2009Article
- Article
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3 authors.
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Abstract
The order Proboscidea includes extant elephants and their extinct relatives and is closely related to the aquatic sirenians (manatees and dugongs) and terrestrial hyracoids (hyraxes). Some analyses of embryological, morphological, and paleontological data suggest that proboscideans and sirenians shared an aquatic or semiaquatic common ancestor, but independent tests of this hypothesis have proven elusive. Here we test the hypothesis of an aquatic ancestry for advanced proboscideans by measuring delta(18)O in tooth enamel of two late Eocene proboscidean genera, Barytherium and Moeritherium, which are sister taxa of Oligocene-to-Recent proboscideans. The combination of low delta(18)O values and low delta(18)O standard deviations in Barytherium and Moeritherium matches the isotopic pattern seen in aquatic and semiaquatic mammals, and differs from that of terrestrial mammals. delta(13)C values of these early proboscideans suggest that both genera are likely to have consumed freshwater plants, although a component of C(3) terrestrial vegetation cannot be ruled out. The simplest explanation for the combined evidence from isotopes, dental functional morphology, and depositional environments is that Barytherium and Moeritherium were at least semiaquatic and lived in freshwater swamp or riverine environments, where they grazed on freshwater vegetation. These results lend new support to the hypothesis that Oligocene-to-Recent proboscideans are derived from amphibious ancestors.
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