In a recently published research, scientists described a "lost continent" that was once sandwiched between Europe, Africa, and Asia, and investigated how ancient mammals may contribute to the mystery.
As indicated in an NBC News report, a low-lying landmass, which scientists have called "Balkanatolia," allowed mammals all over Asia to cross into Europe, stimulating the native European fauna's extinction, in an event called Grande Coupure, which basically changed the biodiversity of the region.
According to the new study, a forgotten or lost continent that once linked Asia to southern Europe may have shaped an ancient passageway that helped animals travel westward, leading to an abrupt and extensive extinction event roughly 34 million years ago.
The study helps fill in a long-lasting mystery of how particularly Asian mammals which range from ancient relatives of the rhinoceros to rodents and hoofed mammals that were distant ancestors of the present time's horses, wound up inhabiting another continent.
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Ancient Mammal Invasion in Europe
According to one of the study's co-authors, paleontologist and distinguished professor K. Christopher Beard from the University of Kansas, people have basically known for decades that Asian mammals invaded Europe somehow. He added, what was not known was how they did it and which route they took.
Beard, together with colleagues, used fossils discovered in Turkey and elsewhere on the Balkan Peninsula, encompassing what remains of the lost continent to trace the ancient mammals' movements throughout the region.
During the Eocene Epoch, which spanned between 55 million and 34 million years ago, Europe and Asia were home to distinctly different kinds of mammals. By the end of the Eocene though, there was a drastic shift, a similar News Nation USA report specified.
Beard explained, many animals that had been living in Europe for millions of years and were doing fine "went extinct." He also said these animals got replaced by mammals that clearly didn't have any ancestral forms in Europe.
Link Between Balkanatolia and Europe
Such a discovery of fossilized remains with apparently inexplicable origins proposed that the era had gone through profound paleogeographic changes over time.
The co-author said there were clues that something really strange was going on. He added some of the animals that were inhabiting Balkanatolia simply don't occur anywhere else. Then the combinations of animals that lived there did not live together anywhere else.
In this research published in the Earth-Science Reviews journal, the researchers discovered that approximately 50 million years ago, Balkanatolia existed as an island continent, apart from its neighbors. Essentially, the landmass had its own distinctive fauna, different from the animals that occupied Europe and Asia.
Beginning roughly 40 million years ago, a combination of tectonic moves, expanding ice sheets, and unstable sea levels joined Balkanatolia first to Asia and then linked the continent to southern Europe, creating a giant land bridge throughout the region.
At the time, the sea levels decreased by around 230 feet, "which is huge," according to scientist Alexis Licht from the French National Center for Scientific Research, who led the research. This event alone would have created a lot of land bridges, and it is by the main hypothesis to describe the link between Balkanatolia and Europe.
Report about the lost continent is shown on Wonder World's YouTube video below:
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