In what country did Dr Gingerich go to look for whale fossils?
In 1978, paleontologist Phil Gingerich discovered a 52-million-year-old skull in Pakistan that resembled fossils of creodonts -- wolf-sized carnivores that lived between 60 and 37 million years ago, in the early Eocene epoch.
Where have whale fossils been found?
Egypt's Western Desert region is already known for the so-called Whale Valley, or Wadi al-Hitan, a tourist attraction and the country's only natural World Heritage site that contains fossil remains of another type of prehistoric whales.Sep 15, 2021
Where did paleontologist find fossilized whale bone?
The fossil was found in the desert of Wadi Al-Hitan, a place so rich in cetacean fossils that it's known as Whale Valley.Dec 11, 2019
What did Dr Gingerich ultimately find that helped confirm the phylogeny of ancient whales?
Professor of Geological Sciences
In 2000, he found fossils that confirmed the assertion by molecular biologists that whales evolved not from mesonychids, extinct wolf-like animals, but from artiodactyls, the ancestors of hippos and camels.
Was a whale fossil found in Egypt?
Sept. 14, 2021, at 5:18 a.m. CAIRO (AP) — Egyptian scientists say the fossil of a four-legged prehistoric whale, unearthed over a decade ago in the country's Western Desert, is that of a previously unknown species. The creature, an ancestor of the modern-day whale, is believed to have lived 43 million years ago.Sep 14, 2021
What whales are in Egypt?
Sixteen species of cetacean have been recorded in the Red Sea, including spinner, spotted, bottlenose and Risso's dolphins, and occasionally false killer whales, Bryde's whales or even (rarely) humpback whales1,2.
How old is fossilized whale bone?
The anatomical name for this bone is Tympanic Bulla. These fossils are 15 million years old (Miocene Epoch), which was a period when many recognizably modern animals evolved.
How a whale fossil can be found on top of a mountain?
When these animals died from 15 million to 20 million years ago, their carcasses settled to the ocean floor and were embedded in submarine sediments. But since then, the violent upthrusting of the Andean chain has carried the sediments to the tops of mountains.Mar 12, 1987
How did whale fossils get in mountains?
The shifting tectonic plates and earthquakes had moved a whale once fossilized on the seafloor to the top of a mountain in Scotts Valley in Santa Cruz, California, over the course of the 4 million years since the whale's demise.Sep 22, 2015
What was unusual about the fossil skull that Gingerich discovered in Pakistan?
What was unusual about the fossil skull that Phil Gingerich discovered in Pakistan? He found a skull with an expanded bony bulb, similar to a structure found in a modern whale skull.
What does Dr Gingerich study?
His research focus is in vertebrate paleontology, especially the Paleocene-Eocene transition and early Cenozoic mammals. His primary research focus is in the origin of modern orders of mammals and he is a leading expert on the evolution of primates and whales.
What are the gaps in whale evolution?
Scientists think they've filled an important gap in whale evolution - the fossilised remains of a specimen that lived around 36.4 million years ago, and is thought to be one of the first whales to use large, sieve-like combs called baleen instead of teeth to filter their food.May 15, 2017
Why is this fossil called the whale of Pakistan?
Phil Gingerich (whale paleontologist, University of Michigan) named this fossil (which means “whale of Pakistan” because he found the bones in Pakistan and cetus is Latin for “whale”).
Is there any evidence that terrestrial cetaceans have existed?
There are no living “terrestrial cetaceans,” and there is no indisputable fossil evidence presented in the Nature article or any other evolutionist publication that such creatures ever existed in the past.
Is Pakicetus a whale?
by Dr. Terry Mortenson on March 25, 2014. The creature Pakicetus was initially regarded as a primitive whale, while further analysis confirms it was a land-dwelling mammal. As described in my previous article, I went on a speaking tour in the UK last year. Organizers in one city invited hundreds of university professors in the area to attend one ...
