The mystery of life in the wildest part of the earth

Over 80% of plants and more than 90% of animals in Madagascar cannot be found anywhere else on the planet. That's why that domain name urged the action of so many passionate people to explore.

Lemur

The big secret that everyone is curious about Madagascar is how does this land reclaim those unique species? A new study, published in the journal Nature, provides strong evidence that the return of the theory that ancient mammals were swept away hundreds of kilometers along the African continent, adhere to drifting vegetation. And this includes most of Madagascar's most famous inhabitants: lemurs, a primitive animal - like humans - but different from any other primates in the world.

Climate computing model

Using climate computing models to restore ancient ocean flows, Jason Ali from Hong Kong University and Mathew Huber from the University of Perdue in the United States, proved that during lemur time supposed to visit Madagascar (about 60 million years ago), there were flows to bring the ocean surface from northern Mozambique east to Madagascar, pushing ocean currents backwards, a gradual change of Madagascar positioning north as present.

Ali and Huber discovered that in three or four weeks each century, the flow of water eastward was strong enough to push a log from Mozambique to Madagascar in a month. A small mammal, like the ancient lemur, can completely adhere to that log and survive for such a long time and distance.

Perhaps uncertain, genetic studies have hypothesized that the colonization works brought all the ancestors of mammals to Madagascar, including carnivores / plants. eating insects, rodents and swarms of living animals are Madagascar porcupines (insectivores, long noses). And for tens of millions of years, that of course became possible.

A meal of lions (pictured above) and Madagascar hedgehog

This new evidence has resisted other theories that Madagascar's animals have come here along the strip of land connecting the continents. This other theory does not explain why other African animals, including many with large bodies like antelopes, elephants and monkeys, do not go that way to Madagascar.

This finding not only helps us understand how the great wildlife of Madagascar has evolved, but also for humans to understand one more thing: biology can tell us a story about science. Earth's substance.