Life restoration of the dolphins described in this study: Kentriodon in the foreground, in the background a squalodelphinid (left) and a physeterid (right) chasing a group of eurhinodelphinids. (Credit: Jaime Chirinos)
Life restoration of the dolphins described in this study: Kentriodon in the foreground, in the background a squalodelphinid ( left ) and a physeterid ( right ) chasing a group of eurhinodelphinids. (Credit: Jaime Chirinos) - Twenty million years ago, the Swiss Plateau region, or -Mittelland-, was an ocean in which dolphins swam. Researchers at the University of Zurich's Paleontological Institute have now discovered two previously unknown species related to modern sperm whales and oceanic dolphins, which they identified based on ear bones. About 20 million years ago, as the climate became warmer and warmer, sea levels rose and flooded the low-lying areas of Europe. Switzerland at that time was part of an island landscape populated by fish, sharks and dolphins, with mussels and sea urchins on the seabed. Holding a dolphin earbone fossil ( right ) and an enlarged 3D print of the inner ear ( center ). The spiral is the cochlea, an organ involved in hearing.
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