Dogs and Cats Share 65-Million-Year-Old Miacid Ancestor as Dogs Emerged 12 Million Years Earlier
Updated
Updated · BBC Discover Wildlife · Aug 15
Dogs and Cats Share 65-Million-Year-Old Miacid Ancestor as Dogs Emerged 12 Million Years Earlier
2 articles · Updated · BBC Discover Wildlife · Aug 15
Summary
65 million years ago, small carnivoran-like mammals called miacids became the last common ancestors of both dogs and cats, according to the report.
42.5 million years ago, the first true dogs appeared in North America, while true cats emerged much later—about 30 million years ago—in Eurasia, putting dogs roughly 12 million years earlier.
Hesperocyon, the earliest true dog, and Proailurus, the earliest true cat, looked surprisingly similar: low-slung, long-tailed and partly adapted to climbing, with teeth suggesting more omnivorous diets than their descendants.
90 million years ago, humans split from the lineage that later produced carnivorans, making people equally related to dogs and cats in evolutionary terms.
Genetically, cats retain chromosome organization closer to humans, making human and cat genomes about twice as similar in arrangement as human and dog genomes.