palaeontologist in Spain have discovered the fossilized remains of a Modern giraffid which has helped them better understand the lineage of the giraffid family .
The discovery , reported inPLOS ONE , was made near Madrid , Spain . The new metal money has been namedDecennatherium rexand it lived during the late Miocene , around 9 million year ago , in the Iberian peninsula . It is a surprisingly complete specimen and the research worker are particularly concerned in its skull .
There are 30 account out fellow member of the giraffid family but a lack of skull has been a big challenge in work out the relationship between them and their living posterity . Skulls are highly important in find out the relationship within clade , groups of organisms that have a plebeian ancestor . This determination allows researchers to compare both its anatomic and phylogenetic data with other bed coinage , both living and extinct .
The skull ofD. rexhas four horn - like protuberances , know as ossicones , two above the centre and two further back . The team believes that this specimen is the first known example of this particular ossicone layout . This would make its genus the most basal branch of a clade of extinct giraffids , which includes the sivatheres and the samotheres .
" New four horned out giraffidDecennatherium rexfrom Cerro de los Batallones throw off luminousness on the evolution of the giraffid family and the nonextant giant Sivatherium , " lead author María Ríos , from the National Museum of Natural History , Spain , enunciate in astatement .
Including the Decennatherium in the sivathere - samothere clade would make this out chemical group of giraffids the most successful that ever lived , both geographically and chronologically . They would have existed between 9 million and a few thousand twelvemonth ago , from Africa and Europe , all the way of life to the Indian poor boy - continent .
There are currently only two living giraffids , okapis and giraffes . lately , genic analyses have read that there are four species of giraffe . Unfortunately , all these terrific animals are jeopardize due to human natural process . The current idea suggest that their numbers might have shrunk by about40 percentin just the last 15 years .
