Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus), sometimes referred to as the duck-billed platypus, is a semiaquatic, egg-laying mammal endemic to eastern Australia, including Tasmania. The platypus is the sole living representative or monotypic taxon of its family Ornithorhynchidae and genus Ornithorhynchus , though a number of related species appear ...
The platypus has an average body temperature of about 31 °C (88 °F) rather than the averages of 35 °C (95 °F) for marsupials and 37 °C (99 °F) for placentals. [ 30 ] [ 31 ] Research suggests this has been a gradual adaptation to the harsh, marginal environmental niches in which the few extant monotreme species have managed to survive ...
Male platypuses have sharp spurs on their back legs shaped like a canine tooth. These hollow spurs measure 0.59 to 0.71 inches long and connect to crural glands in the animal’s upper thighs.
However, the five species of monotreme, the platypuses and the echidnas, lay eggs. The monotremes have a sex determination system different from that of most other mammals. [ 2 ] In particular, the sex chromosomes of a platypus are more like those of a chicken than those of a therian mammal.
Despite their awkward appearance, the platypus has a superpower-like sixth sense that it uses to hunt. With a beaver’s tail, webbed feet, and a duck’s bill, platypuses are one of the world’s ...
The mammals included are only viviparous (marsupials and placentals) as some mammals, which are monotremes (including platypuses and echidnas) lay their eggs. A marsupial has a short gestation period, typically shorter than placental. For more information on how these estimates were ascertained, see Wikipedia's articles on gestational age.
Rheobatrachus, whose members are known as the gastric-brooding frogs or platypus frogs, is a genus of extinct ground-dwelling frogs native to Queensland in eastern Australia. The genus consisted of only two species, the southern and northern gastric-brooding frogs, both of which became extinct in the mid-1980s.
Looking into the genetic determinants of human sex can have wide-ranging consequences. Scientists have been studying different sex determination systems in fruit flies and animal models to attempt an understanding of how the genetics of sexual differentiation can influence biological processes like reproduction, ageing [24] and disease.