CWRU researchers report on 13 million-year-old fossil remains of an astrapothere
STORY BY: EDITORIAL STAFF
A team of researchers at Case Western Reserve University reported on 13 million-year-old fossil remains of a very large, extinct mammal—known as an astrapothere—which was found at the Quebrada Honda paleontological site in Bolivia. The research team also analyzed the paleobiology of Middle Miocene astrapotheres from Bolivia and determined that they likely filled an ecological niche similar to modern black rhinoceros.
Led by Macalester undergraduate student Julia van Orman, the study was later published in a paper titled “New remains and paleoecology of uruguaytheriine astrapotheres (Mammalia) from the Middle Miocene of Bolivia,” and selected as one of two Editors’ Choice articles for an issue of Acta Paleontologica Polonica.
Members of the research team also included:
- Angeline Catena (GRS '17, geology), a former teaching assistant;
- Smruthi Maganti (CWR ’19), a CWRU alum who studied biology at the College of Arts and Sciences;
- Darin A. Croft, chair of the Department of Anatomy at the School of Medicine;
- Federico Anaya, professor of geology at Universidad Autonóma Tomás Frías in Potosí, Bolivia; and
- Oscar E. Wilson, a colleague from Finland who helped contribute paleoecological analyses.