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Thursday, October 28, 2010

Photo: Platypus Much Older Than Thought, Lived with Dinos


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CT scans of a fossil jawbone (pictured above) reveal a large jaw canal in a creature once thought to be a forebear of the platypus and related species.

Scientists say the large jaw suggests the fossil actually is from a type of platypus, a finding that sets the origin of the duck-billed, egg-laying mammal back tens of millions of years earlier than previously believed.

Images courtesy Timothy Rowe