Early Mammals Shrank – Twice – During Global Warming in Paleogene Era

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DURHAM, N.H. – When the Earth heated up about 50 million years ago in a series of extreme global warming events, early mammals shrank in response. While this mammalian dwarfism had been previously linked to the largest of these events, University of New Hampshire doctoral student Abigail D’Ambrosia and colleagues connected this dwarfism to a second, smaller so-called hyperthermal, indicating an important pattern that could inform our understanding of current human-caused climate change.

D’Ambrosia presented the team’s findings today at the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology’s annual meeting in Los Angeles.

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