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Marsupials are a diverse group of mammals belonging to the infraclass Marsupialia.They are natively found in Australasia, Wallacea, and the Americas.One of the defining features of marsupials is their unique reproductive strategy, where the young are born in a relatively undeveloped state and then nurtured within a pouch on their mother's abdomen.
instead of a cloaca [a] like monotremes, marsupials and most other vertebrates, the conduits of the urogenital system exit through the vulva or penis and the rectum opens as the anus. [7] The main internal organs and conduits of the placental urogenital system consist of one or two uteri , a single vagina , and a urethra for females, and a ...
Peramelemorphia includes the bandicoots and bilbies: it equates approximately to the mainstream of marsupial omnivores. All members of the order are endemic to the twin land masses of Australia - New Guinea and most have the characteristic bandicoot shape: a plump, arch-backed body with a long, delicately tapering snout, very large upright ears ...
A marsupial has a short gestation period, typically shorter than its estrous cycle, and gives birth to an underdeveloped newborn that then undergoes further development; in many species, this takes place within a pouch-like sac, the marsupium, located in the front of the mother's abdomen.
The pouch is a distinguishing feature of female marsupials, monotremes [1] [2] [3] (and rarely in the males as in the yapok [4] and the extinct thylacine); the name marsupial is derived from the Latin marsupium, meaning "pouch". This is due to the occurrence of epipubic bones, a pair of bones projecting forward from the pelvis.
Due to the fact that placental mammals and marsupials nourish their developing embryos via the placenta, the ovum in these species does not contain significant amounts of yolk, and the yolk sac in the embryo is relatively small in size, in comparison with both the size of the embryo itself and the size of yolk sac in embryos of comparable developmental age from lower chordates.
The Sulawesi bear cuscus, also known as the Sulawesi bear phalanger (Ailurops ursinus), is a species of arboreal marsupial in the family Phalangeridae that is endemic to Sulawesi and nearby islands in Indonesia. It lives in tropical moist lowland forest at elevations up to 600 m (2,000 ft) and is diurnal, folivorous and often found in pairs. [2]
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.