Everett Han
Mr. Mathieu
Period 2

Michael Angelo Francisco
January 15, 2014
http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/story/343965/scitech/science/cats-and-dogs-had-a-common-ancestor-and-here-it-is

Summary:
 Recently, a fossil was found that is thought to be the ancestor of both dogs and cats. This name of this animal is "Dormaalocyon". This animal was estimated to be about a foot in length and about a kilogram in weight and preys on smaller animals and insects. Scientists found that 280 of the nearly 14,000 teeth specimens that they found in Dormaal’s soil belonged to the ancient tree mammal. Based of of these findings, the primitive teeth and the age of them place it very close to the carnivoraforms’ evolutionary roots. Anklebones that were found pointed out that the creature spent most of its time scurrying from tree to tree in the warm, humid woodlands of its time. It has been confirmed to be one of the earliest carnivores. This animal helped scientists figure out that there may have been an even earlier group than the carnivoraforms from whom they descended from. The Dormaalocyon  provides information concerning the evolution of placental mammals after the disappearance of the largest dinosaurs. Their study showed that carnivoraforms were very diversified at the earliest Eocene, which allows hypothesizing that they were probably already diversified during the latest Paleocene.

Connection:
This relates to what we are discussing in class because it says that both dogs and cats evolved from the same ancestor. It is important to know that this article informs people that many animals, including stereotypical enemies such as cats and dogs can be descendants of the same ancestor. This also relates to how we have talked about different time periods because it was mentioned in the article that the Dormaalocyon appeared after the era known as Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum.