BUSCADOR RECOLECTA

The climatic evolution of the Neogene, with long-term cooling disrupted by the Middle Miocene Climatic Optimum (MMCO; ~17–14.75 Ma), arises as a suitable baseline to analyze the effects of these transcendent climatic changes on the mammalian community structures. The present investigation is an attempt to examine the palaeohabitat of a Neogene (Middle Miocene: ~15–11.5 Ma) geographically distant (i.e., from Spain, China, and India) extinct mammalian communities utilizing the cenogram approach (in both qualitative and quantitative framework). The detailed statistical analyses (presented herein) incorporating a total of eight mammalian communities allows us to infer predominance of Tropical Deciduous Forest environments between ~15 and ~11.5 Ma interval, with several pulses of distinctive aridity experienced by some communities thriving within the Iberian region. On the contrary, stable forested conditions were witnessed by the middle Miocene communities of Asia [i.e., the ~11.5 million-year-old mammalian community of Laogou (China), and the ~13.5 million-year-old mammalian community of Ramnagar (north India)]. Our present investigation also infers that additional mammalian remains (particularly of body mass of <35 kg) are warranted to decipher the habitat (based on cenogram approach) of the Middle Miocene (~13 Ma) mammalian community of Kalagarh (Himalayan Foreland Basin, north India) and the Middle Miocene (~14 Ma) mammalian community of Palasava (Kutch Basin, western India). Nonetheless, the Cenogram technique (being continuously developed over the past six decades) may become an important tool to decipher any habitat change(s) of western India’s mammalian communities considering renewed palaeontological efforts within the Neogene of the region.

The present study is an attempt to utilize cenogram methodology (both qualitative and quantitative) to consider mammalian communities from fve early to late Eocene localities across the globe (i.e., Polecat Bench, Bighorn Basin, North America; Abbey Wood, Blackheath Formation, UK; Cambay Shale, Cambay Basin, India; Wutu Formation, Wutu Basin, China; Pondaung Formation, Myanmar) so as to provide a comparative palaeohabitat framework. It is also a frst attempt to examine the palaeohabitat of an extinct mammalian community (i.e., from Cambay Shale) in India utilizing the cenogram approach. In addition, seven extinct middle-Miocene communities (Laogou, Linxia Basin, China; Estación Imperial, Spain; Paseo de las Acacias, Spain; Arroyo del Olivar-Puente de Vallecas, Spain; Somo-saguas, Spain; Paracuellos 5, Spain; Paracuellos 3, Spain) have also been considered, in order to provide a global perspective to the climatic inferences in a temporal context. The majority of statistical calculations for Paleogene communities expose forested and humid conditions, excluding the Cambay Shale mammalian community of India. A hidden diversity within the medium to large body-size category of mammals (disguising the mammal biodiversity expected in tropical forested habitats) from Cambay Shale (western India) is a plausible cause of digression in the results. This is refected in the histograms showing relationships between proportions of mammal species in various body-mass categories. Furthermore, the results show that Neogene mammalian communities were sustained in comparatively open habitats. Diferences between occidental European and Asian localities in the canopy and humidity of the Neogene environments are also refected in our analyses.

We describe two carnivoran coprolites found in the pseudokarst natural carnivore trap of Batallones-3, from the Late Miocene of Spain. The larger one, comprising multiple indistinguishable fragments of broken and corroded bones, indicates that the producer of the dropping might have been highly capable of crushing the softer parts of large bones. On the other hand, the smaller one shows several relatively larger and more complete bone fragments, thus exhibiting a greater capacity to break and swallow large portions of bone. The external morphology of the large coprolite is similar to that of extant bears, whereas the smaller one more closely resembles that of the living insectivorous hyaenid Proteles in morphology, on the one hand, and that of the viverrid Genetta in size, on the other hand. We hypothesize that the amphicyonid Magerycion anceps was the producer of the large coprolite and the jackal-sized basal hyaenid Protictitherium crassum excreted the smaller one. Thus, we present the first direct evidence of a bone durophagous diet in the carnivorans of Batallones.

Els Casots is one of the richest fossil vertebrate sites of the Vallès-Penedès Basin (Catalonia, Spain). It was discovered in 1989 and excavated briefly during the 1990s, resulting in the recovery of thousands of remains and the erection of several new mammal species. Excavations were resumed in 2018 and continue to date. Here we provide updated results regarding the age, stratigraphy, biota and palaeoenvironment of the site. The age of the site is well constrained to ~15.9 Ma thanks to recent bio- and magnetostratigraphic data, thus coinciding with the Miocene Climatic Optimum (MCO). The stratigraphic succession at the site area indicates lacustrine to palustrine environments with cyclically oscillating water level. There are several fossiliferous layers that have yielded a vertebrate fauna comprising up to 75 different vertebrate species including amphibians, reptiles, birds and mostly mammals. The finding of several articulated partial skeletons indicate that the site records an autochthonous to parautochthonous assemblage. The abundance and completeness of the vertebrate remains together with a well-constrained age and detailed stratigraphic and palaeoenvironmental data, make els Casots a key site for understanding wetland ecosystems in southern Europe during the MCO.

The fossil record of lynxes provides clear evidence of a large range across the North Hemisphere during the Pliocene and Pleistocene. However, their origin, systematics and evolutionary relationships are still fraught with difficulties and controversy. Here we report a complete hemimandible of a medium-sized felid from the Early Pleistocene (MN17, middle Villafranchian, 2.05 Ma) site of La Puebla de Valverde (Teruel, Spain). Based on comparative and multivariate analyses of the lower dentition of 458 individuals of medium-sized Lynx, Caracal and Leptailurus, we confidently ascribe the remains to Lynx aff. issiodorensis. Although the dental proportions are somewhat different from those of the Eurasian L. issiodorensis (smaller canines and more elongated p4/m1), Lynx aff. issiodorensis shows affinities with the Issoire lynx from the contemporaneous site of Saint Vallier (France), sharing a similar morphology of the mandible, reduced canines, and long m1. We further test the hypothesis that examines the presence of the African/Asian Caracal in the European Plio/Pleistocene for C. depereti and C. issiodorensis, and discard the attribution of L. issiodorensis into Caracal. This mandible extends the record of the genus and contributes to update our understanding of the Lynx lineage and its variability within the European fossil record.

The Campo Coy Basin (SE Spain) exposes >1 km of sedimentary succession with a variety of rocks including a thick evaporitic succession previously associated with the Messinian time. These evaporites were supposedly deposited in a restricted Mediterranean-Atlantic seaway connecting the Lorca and Guadix-Baza basins, although no chronological or geochemical data existed. Here we use palaeomagnetism together with vertebrate and foraminifera biostratigraphy to constrain the age of the Campo Coy succession between <9 Ma and 4.7 Ma. We use geochemistry (δ34S, δ18O and 87Sr/86Sr values) of the gypsum deposits to evaluate their marine or continental origin. In addition, we describe the underlying and overlying lithostratigraphic units to reconstruct the palaeogeographic evolution of this region. Our results show that the sediments were deposited in a continental environment, indicating that the Betic Seaway was already closed in this region during the late Tortonian and that the neighbouring marine basins of Guadix-Baza and Lorca were disconnected during that time. The δ34S, δ18O and 87Sr/86Sr values of the gypsum indicate recycling from the Triassic sulphates. Sedimentary facies of the evaporites point to an environment dominated by a saline lake with continental sabkha episodes developed during the driest periods. Well-defined and laterally continuous evaporitic cyclicity suggests an orbital forcing and high sedimentation rates preceding the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC). Alluvial deposits are contemporaneous with the MSC indicating a dry continental environment in this region during the Mediterranean restriction. Overlaying lacustrine carbonates are rich in small vertebrate fauna including African species that migrated to Europe during the MSC. These carbonates have low δ18O and δ13C values characteristic for freshwater input in an open lake just after the Zanclean flood, suggesting that a wet climate followed the MSC., Funding was provided by the grants CGL-2016-79458 and PID2020-118999GB-I00 from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (MCIN)/ State Research agency of Spain (AEI)/10.13039/501100011033, and by the Catalonian Government Actions 21-SGR-829 and PGC2018-094122-B-100.

The shape of the tree of life is the result of shifting diversification rates, and identifying the factors driving these shifts is one of the main aims in evolutionary biology. Various biotic and abiotic factors have been proposed to have an impact on mammal diversification, such as climatic and tectonic changes, the acquisition of new traits, and expansion into new ecosystems or landmasses.
We used phylogenetic comparative methods to quantify the influence of potential drivers on diversification patterns in extant squirrels (Sciuridae, Rodentia). We conducted a multilayer approach, comparing diversification rates among squirrel lineages depending on their degree of biome specialisation, biogeographic realm occupancy, locomotion adaptations, and presence in mountainous regions.
We generated the most complete phylogeny of squirrels to date, encompassing almost 80% of the extant species, and applied multiple and binary state¿dependent diversification models. All the traits examined showed an influence on diversification rates.
The biome specialist lineages showed the highest speciation rates, suggesting a major role of bioclimatic specialisation on macroevolutionary patterns. A single major event, the Miocene¿Pleistocene radiation of terrestrial¿adapted lineages in North America, left a signal that was recovered in two of our analyses. Both the Nearctic lineages and the terrestrial¿adapted lineages showed high speciation rates, highlighting the fact that that major evolutionary episodes may produce confounding effects in state¿dependent diversification models.
Ancestral reconstructions showed that cold and warm intervals in Earth¿s history had different effects on squirrels¿ diversification, depending on their climatic affinities. Tropical and arboreal squirrels evolved predominantly in the warm intervals, while terrestrial and cold¿adapted squirrels radiated in the cold intervals.
Our findings suggest that, while global climatic shifts are key for the speciation processes in mammalian lineages, lineage¿specific ecological adaptations are critical modulators of the responses of lineages to such environmental shifts, in an interplay that ultimately affects their diversification patterns.

The new fossil micromammal assemblage of Çapak represents a mixture of both Anatolian and European
faunal elements. The locality is very important for understanding faunal evolution in the less well-known time interval at the end of the early Miocene of western Anatolia. In Çapak, nine species of rodents and one species of ochotonid were encountered: the hamsters Democricetodon gracilis, Megacricetodon primitivus, Eumyarion aff. E. montanus, Cricetodon cf. C. aliveriensis, Cricetodon sp., and Karydomys cf. K. strati, the mole-rat Debruijnia sp., the squirrel Aliveria luteyni, the dormouse Myomimus tanjuae n. sp., and the pika Albertona balkanica. The assemblage is referable to Anatolian local zone E or MN unit 4. The relative abundance of the various genera is markedly different from that of the older early Miocene assemblages, suggesting that the environment in Anatolia became drier and had a more open landscape., This work was funded by National Geographic grant “Palaeogeography of Mammals Following the Collision of the African and Eurasian Plates” (GEFNE 140-15). This study was supported by Ege University (TTM/001/2016) and (TTM/002/2016) to SM
and MB. This study was also supported by grants UK/123/2019, UK/145/2020; Scientific Grant Agency of the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the Slovak Republic VEGA 1/0164/19, 1/0533/21, and by the Slovak Research and
Development Agency under contract Nos. APVV-15-0575 and APVV-16-0121. This work was partially supported by project PGC2018-094122-B-I00 funded by FEDER/ Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación-Agencia Estatal de Investigación., Peer reviewed

Mortality curves of extinct rodents can be reconstructed by using relative wear calculated from the amount of dentine exposed. MicroCT scanning of molars of the extinct Eomyid genus Ligerimys shows that this Wear Index increases gradually with wear; this means that wear classes can serve as a proxy for age and can therefore be used to reconstruct mortality curves. We reconstructed mortality curves of three species of Ligerimys from the late early Miocene of Spain. These curves show a similar trend, with decreasing numbers of molars as the amount of wear in each class increases. The curves show remarkable similarities to those of the wood mouse Apodemus. This suggests that Ligerimys was, like Apodemus, at the fast end of the fast-slow continuum, in other words r-selected, though not as extreme as some other rodents., This work was supported by the European Union [SYNTHESYS project, grant ES-TAF-1084]; Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación-Agencia Estatal de Investigación; FEDER/ European Union [PGC2018-094122-B-I00]., Peer reviewed

The new micromammal site of Beydere 3 represents a typical Anatolian MN3 fauna in the high diversification and abundance of Eumyarion. Notably, two Eumyarion species are new; combined, they make up almost half of the assemblage. While Eumyarion beyderensis sp. nov. shows simple morphology in upper molars, Eumyarion aegeaniensis sp. nov. shows a more complex lophs pattern. In addition, Beydere 3 yielded nine species of rodents and an ochotonid: the hamsters Cricetodon kasapligili, Mirrabella crenulata, Megacricetodon hellenicus, Democricetodon doukasi, Vallaris zappai and Eumyarion sp., the dormice Glirulus ekremi and Glis sp., the beaver Steneofiber eseri, the squirrel Palaeosciurus fissurae and Ochotonidae indet. The fauna is significant in that it represents the first common occurrence of Megacricetodon in Anatolia. Eumyarion and Megacricetodon are both dominant groups which may indicate a signal of environmental change, but still closer to wet conditions. This, in combination with the new species of Eumyarion, suggests that Beydere 3 represents a time slice which was previously not recorded in Anatolia. Radiometric dating of ashes overlying the section indicates that the age of the locality is older than 18.21 (± 0.19) Ma., This work was supported by the Ege Üniversitesi (TTM/001/2016,TTM/002/2016);National Geographic Society (GEFNE 140-15); Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (PGC2018-094122-B-I00); Univerzita Komenského v Bratislave (UK/400/2021); Vedecká Grantová Agentúra MŠVVaŠ SR a SAV (1/0164/19, 1/0533/21) and Slovak Research and Development Agency under contracts (APVV-15-0575)., Peer reviewed

[Methods] The material and methods section of the article contains all details concerning the methods used in this study.
[Usage Notes] The readme file contains an explanation of each file uploaded in supplementary files., Establishing an evolutionary timescale is fundamental for tackling a great variety of topics in evolutionary biology, including the reconstruction of patterns of historical biogeography, coevolution and diversification. However, the tree of life is pruned by extinction and very generally molecular data cannot be gathered for extinct lineages. Methodological challenges have prevented until recently the application of tip-dating Bayesian approaches in morphology-based fossil-only datasets. Herein we present a morphological dataset for a group of cricetid rodents to which we apply a battery of methods fairly new in palaeontology that can be used by palaeontologists for the analysis of entirely extinct clades. We compare the tree topologies obtained by traditional parsimony, Bayesian dated and undated phylogenetic approaches and calculate stratigraphic congruence indices for each. Bayesian tip-dated clock methods seem to outperform parsimony in the case of our dataset, which includes highly homoplastic morphological characters. Regardless, all three topologies support the monophyly of Megacricetodontinae, Democricetodontinae and Cricetodontinae. Dispersal and speciation events inferred through Bayesian Binary Markov chain Monte Carlo and biodiversity analyses provide evidence for a correlation between biogeographic events, climatic changes and diversification in cricetids., Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Award: PGC2018-094122-B-100 (MICU/AEI/FEDER,EU).
European Commission, Award: ES-TAF-2579., Peer reviewed

Identifying the drivers of adaptation is key to understanding the origin and evolution of diversity. Here we study the morphological evolution of tooth morphology, a classic example of a conserved structure, to gain insights into the conditions that can overcome resistance to evolutionary change. We use geometric morphometrics of the occlusal surface outline of the fourth lower premolar (p4) of squirrels, a paradigm of a stable tooth morphology, to explore morphological adaptations to diet. Although a versatile generalist dental morphology favors the retention of the ancestral shape, the acquisition of diets that require strong mechanical processing drives morphological change. In particular, species that eat both grass and dry fruits evolved disparate tooth shape morphologies, related to trade-offs between feeding performance that lead to a more or less pronounced change depending on the proportion of those items in their diet. Also, some folivores develop relatively large p4s, and most bark gleaners have relatively small p4s. Ultimately, despite the role of diet shaping these patterns, we showed that diet is not the only factor driving the evolution of tooth morphology., I.M. was funded by a predoctoral grant from the Complutense
University of Madrid (CT27/16-CT28/16) and two travel grants of the same institution to visit museum collections (EB40/17 and EB14/19). I.M. was awarded with the
collection study grant in 2018 granted by the American
Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York. This
work was partially supported by the project PGC2018-
094955-A-I00 and PGC2018-094122-B-I00 of the Spanish
Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (MCI/AEI/FEDER,
EU). This is a contribution of the Research Group Team
UCM-910607 on the Evolution of Cenozoic Mammals and
Continental Palaeoenvironments of UCM., Peer reviewed