PERTH, Australia, Jan. 25 (UPI) -- Fossils from caves under the Nullarbor Plain of Western Australia are providing a rare look at life in the middle Pleistocene era, before human arrival.
Gavin Prideaux and colleagues at the Western Australian Museum in Perth are studying the fossils that include 69 vertebrate species and one mollusk that lived 200,000 to 800,000 years ago. The vertebrate species include 23 kangaroo species, eight of which are previously undescribed.
One discovery provided by the fossils suggests the Australian climate was similar to that of today. The researchers say the fact the fossils appear well adapted to dry conditions suggests climate change alone cannot have been responsible for the subsequent wave of extinctions that swept away most of the Australian megafauna.
The research is described in the current issue of the journal Nature.
