Why Bats Are Flying Machines
Nearly everything about this tiny mammal is shaped by its powers of flight. The post Why Bats Are Flying Machines appeared first on Nautilus.
The ecological success of bats, their almost worldwide distribution, and their phylogenetic diversity is in large part thanks to flight. Bats are the only mammals able to truly fly, and the name of their scientific order, Chiroptera, translates to hand wing.
The oldest nearly complete skeleton of a bat dates from 52.5 million years ago (Onychonycteris finneyi) and shows that bat morphology has remained almost unchanged for over 50 million years. These early bats already displayed the enormously elongated fingers of modern bats, thin wings made of skin anchored to the ankles, and the small, sharp teeth of an insect feeder. The specialized hearing structures they needed to echolocate would come soon after O. finneyi.