This little beast has a big mystery in its ears.

a positive specimen of the Gee's hot river beast, Wang Haibing, isIn the human body, the middle ear is a little guy who has no "presence" and may only get your attention if he becomes inflamed. But it's the "baby" that paleontologists dream of.
Beijing time, November 28, the British journal Nature published online the Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Paleontology and Paleoanthropology assistant researcher Wang Haibing, researcher Wang Yuanqing, and the United States Museum of Natural History researcher Meng Jin on the evolution of the inner ear of early mammals. The researchers proposed a new pattern of mammalian middle ear evolution through the study of the new genus of the early Cretaceous multi-tumored beast, gai's hot river, found in Lingyuan, Liaoning Province.
the fossil was found in the Baiyu 9 Buddha Temple group under the Lingyuan Open-zigou in Liaoning Province, and it is preserved on the same rock slab as a fossil of the North Ticket. After a long period of careful indoor repair, data processing and comparative research, the team determined that the fossil represents a new species of polymafrost-toothed beasts, named gesmo-hot-river animals, which is the first time scientists have reported polymass-toothed animal fossils from the Nine Buddhas group.
most interesting part of this specimen is that its skull preserves a very complete middle ear structure. "Mammal middle ear has been a hot topic of research because mammalian middle ear evolution is considered a classic case of biological repetition. The
the middle ear of a mammal has undergone three stages of evolution, from the middle ear of the jaw to the transition middle ear to the middle ear of a typical mammal. Related research has always been one of the hot topics in the early mammalian evolution research, but the time and mechanism of different middle ear evolution stages in each mammalian branch are always difficult to study.
scientists had no direct evidence until the "Gay hero" appeared.
This work reveals the complete form of the various bone pieces in the middle ear of the polymatic toothed beast, as well as the contact relationship between them, adding a very important puzzle to the evolution of the mammalian tooth bone from the lower jaw ear to the typical mammalian middle ear.
based on this study, researchers have a clearer understanding of the evolution of the upper sepic bone in mammals. The study revealed for the first time that the upper skeletal bone changed from a separate bone in early mammals to a state of gradual healing with the hammer bone, becoming the outer back part of the hammer bone.
, the researchers also proposed a new model of middle ear evolution in early mammals through morphological evidence and systematic developmental analysis.
Among mesothetogenic mammals, hetero-animals evolved from typical mammalian mid-to-late Jurassic at least about 160 million years ago, while all other known mammalian groups retained transition middle ears during the same period, and even later in the early Cretaceous. Why can exotic beasts get the hang of it early?
" Gesze River Jun beast belongs to the alien beast category. In exotic animals, the skull and jaw joints are relatively open patterns, a structure that allows the jaws to have a large range of frontal and rear-lying activity, making the feeding method very unique. Wang Haibing said, "Exotic animals, such as the back and forth activity of a larger feeding method, is likely to provide a very strong choice of the evolution of the middle ear pressure, resulting in the evolution of the middle ear of exotic animals has been accelerated."
Researchers believe that there is also a transitional stage in the evolution of the middle ear, but this phase is likely to last shorter than all other mammalian groups, probably because the unique tooth bone-scale jaw joints and the way they are taken provide more significant choice pressure on the middle ear to break out of the jaw, allowing them to obtain a typical mammalian middle ear morphology at least 160 million years ago, earlier than all other mammalian groups.