Bandicoot fossils and DNA elucidate lineage antiquity amongst xeric-adapted Australasian marsupials.

ABSTRACT: Bandicoots (Peramelemorphia) are a unique order of Australasian marsupials whose sparse fossil record has been used as prima facie evidence for climate change coincident faunal turnover. In particular, the hypothesized replacement of ancient rainforest-dwelling extinct lineages by antecedents of xeric-tolerant extant taxa during the late Miocene (~10 Ma) has been advocated as a broader pattern evident amongst other marsupial clades. Problematically, however, this is in persistent conflict with DNA phylogenies. We therefore determine the pattern and timing of bandicoot evolution using the first combined morphological + DNA sequence dataset of Peramelemorphia. In addition, we document a remarkably archaic new fossil peramelemorphian taxon that inhabited a latest Quaternary mosaic savannah-ri

SUBMITTER: Kear BP 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5121598 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature