Microleo attenboroughi voted amongst the top 10 Open Access Vertebrate Fossil discoveries of 2016
Published on the 09 Nov 2016
Microleo attenboroughi, a new species of tiny marsupial lion announced by ESSRC researchers Dr Anna Gillespie, Prof. Michael Archer and Prof. Suzanne J. Hand, has been voted amongst the top 10 open access vertebrate fossil discoveries of 2016.
Named for the renowned naturalist and broadcaster Sir David Attenborough, the diminutive M. attenbroughi from the early Miocene of Australia would have weighed as little as 600g. It joins eight other species of marsupial lion to be discovered in the Riversleigh World Heritage Area of Queensland.
The top 10 contest was conducted by the PLoS Paleo Community. Around 1000 votes were cast for a list of 38 official contenders in the contest, and the results were announced at the 2016 annual meeting of the Society for Vertebrate Palaeontology in Salt Lake City, Utah.
For the full list of contest winners and more about Microleo, see
https://www.plos.org/paleo-top-ten
http://blogs.plos.org/paleocomm/2016/08/25/little-leo-attenborough-a-new...