2022/05/31 by Hans de Bruijn, Zoran Marković, Wilma Wessels +1 · 1 citation
Earth and Planetary Sciences · Environmental Science · Agricultural and Biological Sciences · #Evolution and Paleontology Studies #Animal Ecology and Behavior Studies #Mollusks and Parasites Studies
paper · pdf · doi:10.1007/s12549-022-00529-z
openalex publication_date 2022/05/31 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23
Abstract A new blind mole-rat species Debruijnia tintinnabulus nov. sp. is described from the late Eocene of south east Serbia. This find is approximately 10 Ma older than the hitherto oldest records of Spalacidae Vetusspalax and Pannoniamys, both from the late Oligocene of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia. The antiquity of the new species (~34 Ma) is in accordance with recent genetically based age estimates of Spalacidae as an early branch of the Supramyomorpha. A review of the fossil record shows that the Spalacidae are probably not closely related to the Rhizomyinae and Myospalacinae. The spalacid finds from the Paleogene of the Balkans and the Neogene of Anatolia suggests that the family underwent a radiation during the Oligocene involving Debruijnia, Vetusspalax , Pannoniamys and Heramys. During the middle and late Miocene Heramys evolved into a large number of species, here all tentatively allocated to Pliospalax.