New insights into the evolutionary history of bears
Thursday, June 12, 2014 - 07:01
in Biology & Nature
According to researchers of the LOEWE Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre (BiK-F), Goethe University Frankfurt and the U.S. Wildlife Service several bear species that today only occur in America or in Asia have hybridized in their evolutionary history. The Beringia land bridge, which in former times connected the habitats of these species, might have enabled their encounter. The large-scale study is based on the comparison and analysis of genetic material of all bear species that still exist. The results have been published recently in the journal Molecular Biology and Evolution.