Isotope data from amino acids indicate Darwin's ground sloth was not an herbivore.

Autor: Tejada JV; Institut des Sciences de l'Évolution, UMR 5554, Université de Montpellier, Montpellier Cedex 5, France. julia.tejada@umontpellier.fr.; American Museum of Natural History, New York, NY, USA. julia.tejada@umontpellier.fr.; Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA. julia.tejada@umontpellier.fr.; Departmento de Paleontología de Vertebrados, Museo de Historia Natural-UNMSM, Lima, Peru. julia.tejada@umontpellier.fr., Flynn JJ; American Museum of Natural History, New York, NY, USA.; Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA., MacPhee R; American Museum of Natural History, New York, NY, USA., O'Connell TC; Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3DZ, UK., Cerling TE; Department of Geology and Geophysics and Department of Biology, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, USA., Bermudez L; Parque Zoológico Huachipa, Lima, Peru., Capuñay C; Parque Zoológico Huachipa, Lima, Peru., Wallsgrove N; Department of Earth Sciences, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Honolulu, USA., Popp BN; Department of Earth Sciences, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Honolulu, USA.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: Scientific reports [Sci Rep] 2021 Oct 07; Vol. 11 (1), pp. 18944. Date of Electronic Publication: 2021 Oct 07.
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-97996-9
Abstrakt: Fossil sloths are regarded as obligate herbivores for reasons including peculiarities of their craniodental morphology and that all living sloths feed exclusively on plants. We challenge this view based on isotopic analyses of nitrogen of specific amino acids, which show that Darwin's ground sloth Mylodon darwinii was an opportunistic omnivore. This direct evidence of omnivory in an ancient sloth requires reevaluation of the ecological structure of South American Cenozoic mammalian communities, as sloths represented a major component of these ecosystems across the past 34 Myr. Furthermore, by analyzing modern mammals with known diets, we provide a basis for reliable interpretation of nitrogen isotopes of amino acids of fossils. We argue that a widely used equation to determine trophic position is unnecessary, and that the relative isotopic values of the amino acids glutamate and phenylalanine alone permit reliable reconstructions of trophic positions of extant and extinct mammals.
(© 2021. The Author(s).)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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