image: This is a schematic diagram showing the relative timing of the expansion of mammal communities along three ecological axes, the ecological rise to dominance of flowering plants, and taxonomic diversification of non-avian dinosaurs. view more
Credit: Meng Chen, Caroline A.E. Strömberg, and Greg Wilson
A study examines the ecological structure of mammalian communities since the Mesozoic era. Fossil evidence shows that Mesozoic mammals underwent ecomorphological diversification, but the hypothesis that extinct mammalian communities had comparable ecological structure to extant small-bodied mammalian communities remains untested. Meng Chen, Gregory P. Wilson, and Caroline A. E. Strömberg determined the ecospace occupation and ecological richness and disparity of 98 extant, small-bodied mammalian communities from various biomes by examining body size, dietary preference, and locomotor mode. The authors used this dataset as a reference to analyze five mammalian communities from the Mesozoic and Cenozoic eras. The authors found that vegetation type, which is dependent on climate, strongly influenced the ecological structure of extant communities. Rainforests, for example, have rich food sources located above ground, are characterized by arboreal and frugivorous species, and have high ecological richness and low disparity. The ecospace of the extinct communities overlapped with that of extant communities, although the former lacked frugivores and granivores. Mid-Late Jurassic communities had low dietary diversity and consisted primarily of insectivores and omnivores. None of the extinct communities closely matched the extant communities. According to the authors, competition with other vertebrates, the rise of flowering plants, and Late Cretaceous dental evolution may have shaped the ecological structure of mammalian communities over time.
Article #18-20863: "Assembly of modern mammal community structure driven by Late Cretaceous dental evolution, rise of flowering plants, and dinosaur demise," by Meng Chen, Caroline A. E. Strömberg, and Gregory P. Wilson.
MEDIA CONTACT: Meng Chen, Nanjing University, CHINA; tel: + 86-13851773612, +1-2404603101; email: mengchen@nju.edu.cn, meng.chen03@gmail.com; Gregory P. Wilson, University of Washington, Seattle, WA; tel: 206-619-1179; email: gpwilson@uw.edu
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Journal
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences