Late Middle Eocene primate from Myanmar and the initial anthropoid colonization of Africa
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- Yaowalak Chaimanee
- Institut International de Paléoprimatologie et de Paléontologie Humaine, Évolution et Paléoenvironnements, Unité Mixte de Recherche (UMR) Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) 7262, Université de Poitiers, 86022 Poitiers Cedex, France;
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- Olivier Chavasseau
- Institut International de Paléoprimatologie et de Paléontologie Humaine, Évolution et Paléoenvironnements, Unité Mixte de Recherche (UMR) Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) 7262, Université de Poitiers, 86022 Poitiers Cedex, France;
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- K. Christopher Beard
- Section of Vertebrate Paleontology, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, Pittsburgh, PA 15213;
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- Aung Aung Kyaw
- Department of Archaeology, Ministry of Culture, Mandalay, Myanmar;
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- Aung Naing Soe
- Department of Geology, Defence Services Academy, Pyin Oo Lwin, Myanmar;
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- Chit Sein
- Department of Geology, Hinthada University, Hinthada, Myanmar;
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- Vincent Lazzari
- Institut International de Paléoprimatologie et de Paléontologie Humaine, Évolution et Paléoenvironnements, Unité Mixte de Recherche (UMR) Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) 7262, Université de Poitiers, 86022 Poitiers Cedex, France;
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- Laurent Marivaux
- Institut des Sciences de l’Évolution, UMR CNRS 5554, Université Montpellier II, 34095 Montpellier, France;
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- Bernard Marandat
- Institut des Sciences de l’Évolution, UMR CNRS 5554, Université Montpellier II, 34095 Montpellier, France;
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- Myat Swe
- Department of Archaeology, Ministry of Culture, Mandalay, Myanmar;
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- Mana Rugbumrung
- Paleontology Section, Department of Mineral Resources, Bangkok 10400, Thailand;
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- Thit Lwin
- Department of Geology, Pyay University, Pyay, Myanmar; and
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- Xavier Valentin
- Institut International de Paléoprimatologie et de Paléontologie Humaine, Évolution et Paléoenvironnements, Unité Mixte de Recherche (UMR) Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) 7262, Université de Poitiers, 86022 Poitiers Cedex, France;
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- Zin-Maung-Maung-Thein
- Department of Geology, University of Mandalay, Mandalay, Myanmar
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- Jean-Jacques Jaeger
- Institut International de Paléoprimatologie et de Paléontologie Humaine, Évolution et Paléoenvironnements, Unité Mixte de Recherche (UMR) Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) 7262, Université de Poitiers, 86022 Poitiers Cedex, France;
抄録
<jats:p>Reconstructing the origin and early evolutionary history of anthropoid primates (monkeys, apes, and humans) is a current focus of paleoprimatology. Although earlier hypotheses frequently supported an African origin for anthropoids, recent discoveries of older and phylogenetically more basal fossils in China and Myanmar indicate that the group originated in Asia. Given the Oligocene-Recent history of African anthropoids, the colonization of Africa by early anthropoids hailing from Asia was a decisive event in primate evolution. However, the fossil record has so far failed to constrain the nature and timing of this pivotal event. Here we describe a fossil primate from the late middle Eocene Pondaung Formation of Myanmar,<jats:italic>Afrasia djijidae</jats:italic>gen. et sp. nov., that is remarkably similar to, yet dentally more primitive than, the roughly contemporaneous North African anthropoid<jats:italic>Afrotarsius</jats:italic>. Phylogenetic analysis suggests that<jats:italic>Afrasia</jats:italic>and<jats:italic>Afrotarsius</jats:italic>are sister taxa within a basal anthropoid clade designated as the infraorder Eosimiiformes. Current knowledge of eosimiiform relationships and their distribution through space and time suggests that members of this clade dispersed from Asia to Africa sometime during the middle Eocene, shortly before their first appearance in the African fossil record. Crown anthropoids and their nearest fossil relatives do not appear to be specially related to<jats:italic>Afrotarsius</jats:italic>, suggesting one or more additional episodes of dispersal from Asia to Africa. Hystricognathous rodents, anthracotheres, and possibly other Asian mammal groups seem to have colonized Africa at roughly the same time or shortly after anthropoids gained their first toehold there.</jats:p>
収録刊行物
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- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
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Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 109 (26), 10293-10297, 2012-06-04
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences