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The Late Pleistocene saw the extinction of many mammals weighing more than 40 kilograms (88 lb), including around 80% of mammals over 1 tonne. The proportion of megafauna extinctions is progressively larger the further the human migratory distance from Africa, with the highest extinction rates in Australia, and North and South America. [12]
The term Australian megafauna refers to the megafauna in Australia [1] during the Pleistocene Epoch. Most of these species became extinct during the latter half of the Pleistocene, and the roles of human and climatic factors in their extinction are contested. There are similarities between the prehistoric Australian megafauna and some mythical ...
Megalania (Varanus priscus) is an extinct species of giant monitor lizard, [1] part of the megafaunal assemblage that inhabited Australia during the Pleistocene. It is the largest terrestrial lizard known to have existed, but the fragmentary nature of known remains make estimates highly uncertain. Recent studies suggest that most known ...
The Australian megafaunal extinctions occurred approximately 30,000 years earlier than the hypothetical Younger Dryas event. [ 65 ] The megafaunal extinction pattern observed in North America poses a problem for the bolide impact scenario since it raises the question of why large mammals should be preferentially exterminated over small mammals ...
The Late Pleistocene witnessed the spread of modern humans outside of Africa as well as the extinction of all other human species. Humans also spread to the Australian continent and the Americas for the first time, co-incident with the extinction of most large-bodied animals in these regions.
Australia was created by the junction of three early pieces of continental crust (cratons). Three areas of the Australian landmass that are made of Archaean rocks are more than 2.5 billion years old, among the oldest known rocks. These igneous and metamorphic rocks are found in the Yilgarn (West) and Pilbara (North) cratons in today's Western ...
The Pliocene (/ ˈplaɪ.əsiːn, ˈplaɪ.oʊ -/ PLY-ə-seen, PLY-oh-; [ 6 ][ 7 ] also Pleiocene) [ 8 ] is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58 [ 9 ] million years ago. It is the second and most recent epoch of the Neogene Period in the Cenozoic Era. The Pliocene follows the Miocene Epoch and is followed ...
Diprotodon (Ancient Greek: "two protruding front teeth") is an extinct genus of marsupial from the Pleistocene of Australia containing one species, D. optatum. The earliest finds date to 1.77 million to 780,000 years ago but most specimens are dated to after 110,000 years ago. Its remains were first unearthed in 1830 in Wellington Caves, New ...