A group of living things
Bats, carnivores and hoofed mammals
Laurasiatheria
Bats, cats, horses and whales in one surprising family.
Its members' last common ancestor lived about 85 million years ago.
You and bats, carnivores and hoofed mammals last shared an ancestor about 95 million years ago (on 23 December, if life's history were one year).
Bats, cats, horses and whales look like strangers, but they belong to one big family. They all share one ancestor, which is why this group feels so surprising. Scientists found the link in their DNA. So far no single body feature has been found that they all share.
That shared past hides behind very different bodies. Bats fly on thin wings of skin stretched over long fingers. Cats, dogs and bears walk on clawed paws, while seals swim with flippers. Horses stand on single hooves, while cows and giraffes stand on split hooves. Whales swim with front flippers and a wide, flat tail. They have no back legs you can see.
You can meet this family on land, in the air and in the sea. They live in cities and on farms, in forests, grasslands and deserts, and in oceans all over the world.
Biggest animal ever
A blue whale can grow to about 30 metres long, as long as two buses. It can weigh up to about 150 tonnes. It weighs more than any known dinosaur.
A mammal in armour
Pangolins are the only mammals with large, overlapping scales over the back and tail, but not on the snout and belly. They have no teeth. They catch ants and termites with a sticky tongue that can reach about 40 centimetres, sometimes longer than the head and body.
Finding the way in the dark
Most bats call out sounds and listen for the returning echo to find food and avoid things around them. There are more than 1,400 bat species, more than one in five of all known mammal species.