Scientists stalking a small marsupial by means of a distant Australian rainforest say they might have discovered a clue to the thriller of why its larger kangaroo cousins hop as an alternative of stroll.
Kangaroos and carefully associated wallabies are the one massive animals to hop upright on two legs, researchers from Australia’s Flinders College mentioned Thursday, however why stays a thriller.
They imagine the reply could lie with the small musky rat-kangaroo, a bush-dwelling marsupial weighing about the identical as a loaf of bread.
Musky rat-kangaroos are a distant ancestor of the bigger kangaroo species that roam the outback.
Researcher Amy Tschirn mentioned musky rat-kangaroos – named for his or her pungent scent – have been the one members of the “macropodoid” household that didn’t hop.
“The musky rat-kangaroo offers a vital perception into how and when the long-lasting hopping type of locomotion developed in Australia,” she mentioned.
Scientists tracked the creatures, also called “muskies”, by means of far-north Queensland’s tropical rainforests.
They noticed the creatures transferring in a “bounding” movement – hopping with their again legs whereas their entrance paws remained on the bottom.
It steered a sort of mid-point within the evolutionary journey from strolling on all fours to hopping on two, the researchers mentioned.
“These outcomes sign a possible pathway to how bipedal hopping developed in kangaroos,” mentioned Harvard College biologist Peter Bishop, who was concerned within the work.
“Maybe it began with an ancestor that moved about on all fours like different marsupials, then an animal that bounded just like the muskies, and at last developed into the long-lasting hopping kangaroos we see in Australia right this moment.,” he mentioned.
Kangaroos and wallabies are the one hopping species heavier than 5kg, the researchers mentioned.
Some smaller rodent species additionally hop.
The researchers mentioned they hoped to search out fossils of historical marsupials to raised perceive the evolution of modern-day kangaroos.
Their findings have been printed Thursday in peer-reviewed journal Australian Mammalogy.
