A new study published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences identified fossil samples of three previously unknown species of multituberculates—an extinct rodent-like mammal group.
The fossils, discovered near Alaska’s North Slope, are about 73 million years old.
Sarah Shelley, a paleontologist and postdoctoral research associate at the University of Lincoln in the United Kingdom, is one of the authors of the study. She explained the rodent-like animals outlasted even the dinosaurs.
“We hypothesized that because it lived in the Arctic, it might have had adaptations that allowed it to survive that or that lineage to survive the extinction,” she said.
The remarkable fossils needed a name. Shelley said the team started with an Inupiaq dictionary looking for root words that described the characteristics of each species, distinctively known for their jagged, small teeth.
“Historically, a lot of species have been named for people who are in the field, sometimes who discovered them,” Shelley said. “There’s been a big push to sort of move away from that now and actually recognize sort of beyond the people, [to] the regions they’ve come from.”
Shelley eventually connected with Gail Smithhisler, an Inupiaq language teacher in Nome, who helped the research team decide on names for the three species: Camurodon borealis, meaning “northern curved tooth”, Qayaqgruk peregrinus, or “little wandering hero”, and Kaniqsiqcosmodon polaris, meaning “polar frost ornamented tooth”.
This project turned out to be a deeply personal one for Smithhisler.
“I was really close with my grandma. Inupiaq was her first language,” she said.
Smithhisler was told to keep her involvement under wraps until the research paper was published. But she decided to tell her grandmother, Edna Ahnangnatoguk, anyway. It was something Smithhisler knew she would be proud of.
“With my grandmother it was important to her that her family not be forgotten,” she explained.
Her grandmother, lovingly known as “Gaga”, passed away before the study was published. But having the opportunity to tell her grandmother about this project Smithhisler says is something she is very grateful for.
“I feel very honored that I can grant my grandma’s wish that her family isn’t going to be forgotten,” she said. “It’s a published document now, so her family name, her mom’s name is always going to be memorialized in that way.”
Shelley’s team is still learning from and looking for more of the ancient fossils. If more are found, she said she suspects they’ll be back in touch with Smithhisler for more inspiration.
