A photo from open sources
A group of scientists at Stanford University (California, USA) found that over the past 55 million years, marine mammals “grown” a hundred and fifty (!) times. These findings confirm Cope’s theory that over time many kinds of animals increase in size. To this conclusion of the paleontologist Edward Cope in the late 19th century pushed upward sizes of land animals, for example, horses.
Modern scientists have analyzed information for more than 17 thousands of different groups of marine animals (arthropods, echinoderms, mollusks and chordates).
Curiously, not all animals have a similar tendency. TO for example, dinosaurs increased, but birds, insects – not. Interesting also that the species that “grew” have become more diverse and, therefore, more successful in terms of survival.
The authors of the study concluded: marine gigantism mammals and reptiles – a consequence of their origin from terrestrial animals, as well as breathing oxygen.
Insects
