Furry appearance, lively and healing cuteness, big eyes with distinct layers, and oriental expression of "animism"... On December 22, the mascot image of China Central Radio and Television's "2023 Spring Festival Gala" "Rabbit Yuanyuan" "Official debut. This is also the first Spring Festival Gala mascot IP in the 40-year history of the Spring Festival Gala that incorporates the favorite tendencies of countless audiences and is generated through systematic and detailed big data research.
The mascot image of China Central Radio and Television's "2023 Spring Festival Gala" is "Rabbit Yuanyuan".
But if you think this is just a soft and cute little girl, then underestimate it. The real doorway of "Rabbit Yuanyuan" is hidden on its iconic four incisors.
It is taken from the ecological restoration image of the "Anhui model pika" fossil discovered by scientists from the Institute of Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences (hereinafter referred to as the Institute of Paleontology), and has a typical "rabbit ancestor" about 62 million years ago. characteristics, but also an important clue to a classic scientific problem in the study of lagomorphs in the past 300 years.
Are rabbits and mice the same family?
In life, whenever you see rabbits, they are always busy, chewing food all the time. This is because the rabbit's incisors are constantly growing, and if not sufficiently ground, the incisors will grow outwards rapidly. Too long incisors will make the hare lip unable to close, the rabbit cannot eat normally, and even lead to death in severe cases.
For rabbits, they are grinding their teeth with their lives. And for scientists, it's also important for incisors. Li Qian, a researcher at the Institute of Paleontology, told the Chinese Journal of Science that this is a characteristic feature that distinguishes rabbits from other mammals.
Reconstruction diagram of the model pika. Photo courtesy of Spine Paleo
However, among mammals, there are mice besides rabbits that have lifelong incisors, so rabbits and mice have always been considered to be closely related. Li Qian mentioned that as early as 1735, the founder of modern taxonomy and naturalist Lin Nai included rabbits and rats together as rodents.
"Until 200 years later, some scientists began to point out the difference in the shape of the incisors of rabbits and rats, and a pair of small incisors were hidden behind the upper incisors of rabbits, which was obviously more complicated than that of rodents. Not only that, more and more Scholars found more differences between the two, and then proposed that there is no relationship between rabbits and mice."
This debate has lasted for nearly 100 years, and it has also led to a classic scientific question in the history of lagomorphs research: in the history of life evolution, where is the rabbit in the big family tree of mammals?
"Looking for roots and ancestors" is the housekeeping skill of paleontologists. If you want to know how the lagomorphs originated and whether they are related to rodents, the only way is to find clues from fossils.
The model pika and the oriental squirrel have the same "root"
Since the 1960s, the Chinese Academy of Sciences has organized a large-scale survey of the "red bed" in South China, and discovered Asian-specific mammal groups in the Paleocene strata. This provides an opportunity to explore the origin of rodents and lagomorphs.
In the 1970s, the field investigation team of the Institute of Paleospine discovered several important skull fossils in the same layer of buried hills in Anhui (the age is Early Paleocene, about 62 million years ago), and the incisors were preserved on them. After research by Li Chuankui, a palaeomammalologist and researcher at the Institute of Paleospine in China, they were named Anhui model pika and Dongfang Xiaomo respectively.
The first time he saw the specimen of pika, Li Chuankui, who has "hot eyes", said to himself humorously: "Is it a rabbit? Mother rabbit?" After detailed morphological research, he discovered the characteristics of Anhui pika. Very similar to rabbits, it is proposed that it may be the ancestral type of lagomorphs. The oriental xiaomi may already have the unique "gnawing" function of rodents, which is close to the ancestral type of rodents.
"More importantly, the study also found that there are many intermingled features between the two. The ancestor type of rabbits and mice is 'I am in you, and you are in me'." Li Qian added.
The long-debated origins of lagomorphs and rodents have found their respective "roots" in Qianshan, Anhui. Some people joked that this really shows the "pika family": even the oldest fossils are preserved together.
In 1980, Li Chuankui brought his research on pikas and oriental squirrels to the "International Academic Conference on the Origin of Rodents" held by the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh, USA. At that time, he put forward the view that "pikas are of the same origin", which aroused widespread concern in the international academic circle.
Before the 20th century, paleontologists mainly interpreted the genetic relationship of biological groups from the morphological characteristics of fossils. After the rapid development of molecular biology, the evidence has become more and more abundant.
In 2005, Asher et al. published an article in the "Science" magazine, combining the morphological data of fossils and living lagomorphs with molecular biology data and found that in the early Cenozoic, the ancestors of lagomorphs were positive. It diverged from other placental animals along with rodents. And this study was also supported by the results of the big data matrix analysis in 2013. The ancestors of lagomorphs and rodents did not separate from sisters until the beginning of the new generation, and each embarked on the road of independent evolution.
So far, "pikas have the same origin" can be concluded. The controversy over the origin of the rabbit has finally come to an end.
"Rabbit Yuanyuan" = Chinese science story + Chinese traditional culture
Li Chuankui contributed a lot to helping the rabbit find its ancestors. In addition to the Anhui model pika, in 1965, he studied the Eocene rabbit-shaped fossils in northern my country, including the earliest and most primitive rabbit-shaped rabbit in the world at that time-the Luohe Lushi rabbit (about 4600 years ago) 10,000 to 43 million years); in 2007, he and his team discovered the ancient Dawson rabbit (about 53 million years ago) in the Early Eocene strata of Erlian Basin, Inner Mongolia, my country. The rabbit among the animals of the order broke the record of Luohe Lushi rabbit, and was awarded the title of "the world's first rabbit"...
It is precisely because the research team led by the older generation of paleontologists has been running for decades on the mountains, rivers and Gobi of the motherland, filling in the blanks step by step, so that my country has almost complete fossil evidence of rabbit evolution.
It can be said that the mascot of the 2023 Spring Festival Gala "Rabbit Yuanyuan" not only contains the connotation and beauty of the zodiac rabbit, but also makes the outstanding scientific research achievements and tenacious scientific spirit of Chinese scientists shine.
(Original title "The "cute" 62 million years ago is going to be on the Spring Festival Gala")
