Portal:Primates

The Primates Portal A primate is a member of the biological order Primates, the group that contains lemurs, the aye-aye, lorisids, galagos, tarsiers, monkeys, and apes, with the last category including great apes. With the exception of humans, who inhabit every continent on Earth, most primates live in tropical or subtropical regions of the Americas, Africa and Asia. Primates range in size from the 30-gram (1 oz) pygmy mouse lemur to the 200-kilogram (440 lb) mountain gorilla. According to fossil evidence, the primitive ancestors of primates may have existed in the late Cretaceous period around 65 mya (million years ago), and the oldest known primate is the Late Paleocene Plesiadapis, c. 55–58 mya. Molecular clock studies suggest that the primate branch may be even older, originating in the mid-Cretaceous period around 85 mya. Primates exhibit a wide range of characteristics. Some primates do not live primarily in trees, but all species possess adaptations for climbing trees. Locomotion techniques used include leaping from tree to tree, walking on two or four limbs, knuckle-walking, and swinging between branches of trees (known as brachiation). Primates are characterized by their large brains relative to other mammals. These features are most significant in monkeys and apes, and noticeably less so in lorises and lemurs. Many species are sexually dimorphic, which means males and females have different physical traits, including body mass, canine tooth size, and coloration. More about Primates... Selected article The evolutionary history of lemurs occurred in isolation from other primates on the island of Madagascar for at least 40 million years. Lemurs are prosimian primates belonging to the suborder Strepsirrhini, which branched off from other primates less than 63 mya (million years ago). They share some traits with the most basal primates, and thus are often confused as being ancestral to modern monkeys, apes, and humans. Instead, they merely resemble ancestral primates. Lemurs are thought to have evolved during the Eocene or earlier, sharing a closest common ancestor with lorisiforms. Fossils from Africa and tests of nuclear DNA suggest that lemurs made their way to Madagascar between 40 and 52 mya. Molecular tests offer an alternative date range of 62 to 65 mya. An ancestral lemur population is thought to have inadvertently rafted to the island on a floating mat of vegetation, although hypotheses for land bridges and island hopping have also been proposed. The timing and number of hypothesized colonizations has traditionally hinged on the phylogenetic affinities of the Aye-aye, the most basal member of the lemur clade. Having undergone their own independent evolution on Madagascar, lemurs have diversified to fill many niches normally filled by other types of mammals. They include the smallest primates in the world, and once included some of the largest. Since the arrival of humans approximately 2,000 years ago, they are now restricted to 10% of the island, or approximately 60,000 square kilometres (23,000 sq mi), and many are facing extinction. For this reason, researchers have been trying to identify and assess every species. Over the last 10 to 20 years, there has been a steep increase in the number of recognized lemur species and subspecies, both through the discovery of new species and the elevation of existing subspecies to full species status. Currently there are approximately 100 or more recognized species or subspecies of living lemur, which are divided into five families and 15 genera. If the extinct subfossil lemurs are included, an additional three families, eight genera, and 17 species would be included. The recent rise in species numbers is due to both improved genetic analysis and a push in conservation to encourage the protection of isolated and distinct lemur populations. Not everyone in the scientific community supports these taxonomic changes, preferring instead an estimate of 50 living species. Selected picture {{{caption}}} The brown spider monkey, Ateles hybridus, is a species of spider monkey, a type of New World monkey, from South America. It is found in Colombia and Venezuela. Like all spider monkeys, it has very long, spindly limbs and a lengthy prehensile tail which can almost be called a fifth limb. The tail is made up of highly flexible, hairless tips with skin grooves which improves grip on tree branches and is adapted to its strictly arboreal lifestyle. It is currently critically endangered, with few examples of them remaining in the wild. Categories Select [►] to view subcategories Primates Lists of primates Primates by location Primate anatomy Primate behavior Primate conservation Evolution of primates Extinct primates Primate health Primates and humans Primate taxa Primate stubs Selected species {{{caption}}} Critically Endangered (IUCN 3.1)|Critically endangered The cotton-top tamarin (Saguinus oedipus) is a small New World monkey weighing less than 1 lb (0.5 kg). One of the smallest primates, the cotton-top tamarin is easily recognized by the long white sagittal crest extending from its forehead to its shoulders. The species is found in tropical forest edges and secondary forests in northwestern Colombia where it is arboreal and diurnal. Its diet includes insects and plant exudates and it is an important seed disperser in the tropical ecosystem. Groups form a clear dominance hierarchy where only dominant pairs breed. The female normally gives birth to twins and uses pheromones to prevent other females in the group from breeding. These tamarins have been extensively studied for their high level of cooperative care, as well as altruistic and spiteful behaviors. Communication between cotton-top tamarins is sophisticated and shows evidence of grammatical structure, which is acquired. It is thought that up to 40,000 cotton-top tamarins were caught and exported for use in biomedical research before 1976 when CITES gave them the highest level of protection and all international trade was banned. Now the species is at risk due to large-scale habitat destruction, the lowland forest in northwestern Colombia where the cotton-top tamarin is found has been reduced to five percent of its previous size. It is currently classified as critically endangered and is one of the rarest primates in the world with only 6,000 individuals left in the wild. Did you know? ... that although male Kashmir gray langurs are usually protective of infants, they sometimes engage in infanticide? ... that Geoffroy's spider monkey (pictured) has a prehensile tail that can support its entire body weight? ... that the monkey "Marcel" on the TV sitcom Friends was a white-headed capuchin? ... that the Guatemalan black howler and mantled howler monkeys are sympatric over parts of Mexico and Guatemala? ... that the sloth lemurs of the genus Mesopropithecus were once thought to be indriids due to the similarities between their skulls and those of living sifakas? ... that the discovery of Babakotia radofilai, an extinct species of sloth lemur, helped to resolve the relationship between the indriids, sloth lemurs, and monkey lemurs? Primate lists List of lemur species List of Central American monkey species List of Costa Rican monkey species List of Panamanian monkey species List of Neanderthal sites List of apes List of fictional apes List of fictional monkeys List of human evolution fossils List of monkeys List of placental mammals in Order Primates WikiProjects WikiProject Science WikiProject Biology WikiProject Tree of Life WikiProject Animals WikiProject Mammals Wikiproject Primates Topics Humans  Human body • Human evolution • Human ecology • Human development Strepsirrhines  Lemur • Lorisoidea • Adapiformes • List of lemur species Haplorhines  Tarsier • Omomyidae • Monkey • Old World monkey • New World monkey • Ape Related portals Mammals Science History of Science Biology Ecology Evolutionary biology Things to do Here are some tasks awaiting attention: Article requests : Article requests Cleanup : Ebu Gogo, Primate basal ganglia system, More Copyedit : Homo erectus, Multiregional origin of modern humans Expand : Ah Meng, Multiregional origin of modern humans, More Merge : Chimpanzee Sequencing and Analysis Consortium into Chimpanzee genome project Stubs : Giant Aye-aye, Godinotia, Equatorial Saki, Furry-eared Dwarf Lemur, More... 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