Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Wroe S
PROVIDER: S-EPMC3670326 | biostudies-literature | 2013 May
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 20130506 22
Around 88 large vertebrate taxa disappeared from Sahul sometime during the Pleistocene, with the majority of losses (54 taxa) clearly taking place within the last 400,000 years. The largest was the 2.8-ton browsing Diprotodon optatum, whereas the ∼100- to 130-kg marsupial lion, Thylacoleo carnifex, the world's most specialized mammalian carnivore, and Varanus priscus, the largest lizard known, were formidable predators. Explanations for these extinctions have centered on climatic change or human ...[more]