ArticleBiology letters2019
Evidence for convergent evolution of ultrasonic hearing in toothed whales (Cetacea: Odontoceti).
Article in Biology letters, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers.
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13 citing papers in PubMed, 47 citations in OpenAlex.
- Cetacean evolution through the lens of ecospace modeling and disparity analyses.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Predicting ecology and hearing sensitivities in Parapontoporia-An extinct long-snouted dolphin.Anatomical record (Hoboken, N.J. : 2007) · 2026Article
- Morphology of the Tympano-Periotic Complex in Stranded Odontocetes in Northeast Brazil.Journal of morphology · 2025Article
- River dolphin cochlea has not evolved convergently.Biology letters · 2025Article
- Variation in whale (Cetacea) inner ear anatomy reveals the early evolution of "specialized" high-frequency hearing sensitivity.Journal of anatomy · 2025Article
- In search of the origin of crown Mysticeti.Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand · 2024Review
- Evolution and development of the cetacean skull roof: a case study in novelty and homology.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Article
- Evolution of orbit size in toothed whales (Artiodactyla: Odontoceti).Journal of anatomy · 2021Article
- What are the limits on whale ear bone size? Non-isometric scaling of the cetacean bulla.PeerJ · 2021Article
- Wonky whales: the evolution of cranial asymmetry in cetaceans.BMC biology · 2020Article
- Article
- Evidence for convergent evolution of ultrasonic hearing in toothed whales (Cetacea: Odontoceti).Biology letters · 2019Article
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Toothed whales (Cetacea: Odontoceti) are the most diverse group of modern cetaceans, originating during the Eocene/Oligocene transition approximately 38 Ma. All extant odontocetes echolocate; a single origin for this behaviour is supported by a unique facial source for ultrasonic vocalizations and a cochlea adapted for hearing the corresponding echoes. The craniofacial and inner ear morphology of Oligocene odontocetes support a rapid (less than 5 Myr) early evolution of echolocation. Although some cranial features in the stem odontocetes Simocetus and Olympicetus suggest an ability to generate ultrasonic sound, until now, the bony labyrinths of taxa of this grade have not been investigated. Here, we use µCT to examine a petrosal of a taxon with clear similarities to Olympicetus avitus. Measurements of the bony labyrinth, when added to an extensive dataset of cetartiodactyls, resulted in this specimen sharing a morphospace with stem whales, suggesting a transitional inner ear. This discovery implies that either the lineage leading to this Olympicetus--like taxon lost the ability to hear ultrasonic sound, or adaptations for ultrasonic hearing evolved twice, once in xenorophids and again on the stem of the odontocete crown group. We favour the latter interpretation as it matches a well-documented convergence of craniofacial morphology between xenorophids and extant odontocetes.
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