Placental mammal females carry the unborn in their womb and nourish it through the placenta, a pancake-shaped organ that temporarily acts like the baby’s lungs, digestive system, and kidneys ...

[Related: The fiery end of the dinosaurs kicked off the golden age of mammals.] The study revealed that a Cretaceous origin for placental mammals, the diverse group that includes humans ...

As prolonged pregnancy evolved in placental mammals, hundreds of genes began to be expressed that greatly strengthened and elaborated maternal-fetal communication, as well locally suppressing the ...

Dinosaurs did not have mammary glands, much less breasts – that’s only a feature of some placental mammals ... or other parts of their upper digestive system. The fluid contains antibodies ...

The blue whale—190 tonnes in weight and beautifully adapted for swimming—is a placental mammal. The mammal bit means that mothers nourish their babies with milk after they’re born.

For years scientists have debated whether placental mammals - a group of animals which includes humans, dogs and bats - existed at the same time as dinosaurs. Now researchers at the University of ...

but in the early embryos of placental mammals, such as mice and humans, they are largely erased in a ‘system reset’. Surveying DNA methylation in opossum embryos reveals that, in marsupials ...

According to the established view, the extinction of the dinosaurs removed this constraint, allowing mammals to diversify and flourish, and placing them on course to their present position of ...