Sheep-sized ancient relatives of modern-day wombats lived in Australian treetops 15 million years ago, according to Dr Karen Black from the University of New South Wales.
These 70 kg marsupial diprotodontoids were strikingly similar to koalas, said Dr Black, winner of the Australian Academy of Science’s 2012 Dorothy Hill Award for female researchers in the Earth sciences.
Dr Black researches the diversity and evolution of Australia's marsupials with a focus on the extinct plant-eating diprotodontoids. They were the dominant herbivores of Australia's past ecosystems.
Her current research focuses on a 15 million year old fossil cave in north western Queensland that contains exceptionally well-preserved skulls and skeletons of a sheep-sized diprotodontoid marsupial called Nimbadon.
“The Nimbadon fossil material is an incredibly rare and significant resource, not only because it is so exceptionally well-preserved, but because it represents individuals from a range of ages from tiny suckling pouch young to elderly adults,” says Dr Black.
“The Nimbadon material has allowed the first detailed study of skull development in a fossil marsupial as well as brain development and behaviour.”
Their study is also providing a time perspective on the nature and rate of environmental change affecting Australia's past ecosystems, which will help anticipate the impacts of future climate change on Australian biodiversity.
“The cave and its fossils are providing a rich legacy of clues about the environment 15 million years ago, a critical time in Australia's climate history when Australia began its transformation from a land of lush rainforests to the drier continent that it is today,” says Dr Black.
Dr Black will present her work focusing on the as yet unpublished Nimbadon skeleton findings at the Shine Dome in Canberra today at about 12.45pm, as part of the Academy’s annual Science at the Shine Dome event.
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