Australia; International; NSW
Our ears, like most other mammals, have three small bones that help us hear, but in early fossil mammals, these bones were attached to the jaw and they had a second role in helping animals chew. Now Aussie and international researchers have found that a 160 million-year-old fossil of a gliding mammal had ear bones similar to those of the platypus and echidna, which may help tell us more about how and when these ear bones evolved from having two functions to one. The authors say the fossil clarifies the shape of the ear bones in this ancient group of mammals and shows that monotremes such as the platypus and echidna do not have unique ear structures, as has previously been proposed.
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