Naked Science Forum

Life Sciences => Plant Sciences, Zoology & Evolution => Topic started by: thedoc on 21/05/2011 21:11:05

Title: Why do mammals have such big brains?
Post by: thedoc on 21/05/2011 21:11:05

Using state-of-the-art X-ray scanning technology to recreate the brains of 200 million year old animals thought to be ancestral to the mammal group, researchers have shown that these ancient predecessors of modern mammals possessed a highly developed sense of smell. This may be responsible for launching mammals into their present-day big-brained global dominance.

Read the whole story on our  website by clicking here (http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/content/news/news/2268/)

  

Title: Why do mammals have such big brains?
Post by: CZARCAR on 22/05/2011 16:20:37

cause we're warm blooded?

Title: Why do mammals have such big brains?
Post by: CliffordK on 22/05/2011 18:15:42

Hmmm, interesting.
So, it probably wouldn't be best to train one's pet iguana to work as a bloodhound.

One would have to be careful of a study that is only looking at a couple of exemplars.  The sense of smell may be important for these particular rodent-like creatures, but not necessarily all mammals. 

One also has to demonstrate that lizards and other competing animals actually have less brain dedicated to the olfactory senses.