100-Million-Year-Old 'Sabre-Toothed Squirrel' Uncovered

Discovery helps fill in the blanks over what kind of mammals lived among the dinosaurs.

Paleontologists have published a paper detailing their discovery of 100-million-year old fossils of one of the planet's earliest mammals, a sabre-toothed, snout-nosed squirrel-like creature that bears a striking resemblance to the character Scrat from the Ice Age films. The Cronopia dentiacutus fossils were found in Argentina's Patagonia region, a part of South America known for its vast reserves of dinosaur fossils. These little mammals had massive canine teeth relative to the rest of their bodies, which the researchers believe helped them maintain a diet of insects while scurrying about for protection from the massive dinosaurs that would have lived alongside them. The first mammals are believed to have come along around 220 million years ago, but little is known about how they evolved to live all over the world. The researchers hope Cronopia will help them fill in some gaps about the spread of mammals through South America during a time when dinosaurs were the undisputed champions of the planet.