The creature returned from the dead after 11 million years

A rodent-like animal has just been discovered in Laos. It was the surviving individual of an extinct group about 11 million years ago, according to the fossil record.

This animal became the topic in 2005 when it was welcomed as the only new animal discovered in the past 30 years.

Laonastes is about the size of a red squirrel. ( Photo: BBC )
However, scientists now believe it to be a "living fossil", the relic of a group of prehistoric rodents distributed throughout Southeast Asia and Japan.

And for that reason, people need to make immediate efforts to protect it.

The animal, scientifically named Laonastes aenigmamus, was discovered by scientists at a market of Laotian hunters in early 2005. Although it has never been included in the world science list, the animal is quite familiar with the locals, with the name kha-nyou. With dark gray fur and the size of a red squirrel, it has short legs, bushy tail and long muzzle.

Because the skull, teeth, lower jaw and other morphological features of kha-nyou are strangely suited to the fossils of a long-extinct rodent (found in China last summer), the houses Science believes that they belong to the same group - they gnaw extinct Diatomyidae.

Lead researcher Mary Dawson, from the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh, says it is rare for a re-animal species to emerge after such a long period of fossil history.

T. An