Two marsupial species thought long extinct, until now known only from fossils, were found alive in New Guinea through a collaboration of scientists, indigenous communities and citizen scientists. The discovery of the pygmy long-fingered possum and the ring-tailed glider marks the first confirmation of live specimens in over 7,000 years, the Bishop Museum, a natural history museum in Honolulu, announced. The two animals are known as “Lazarus species,” a term for organisms that reappear after being thought to be extinct. “The discovery of two Lazarus species, thought to be extinct for millennia, is unprecedented,” said Australian Museum’s Dr. Tim Flannery in the press release 👇🏻⬇️more in the 1rst comments ⬇️👇🏻.

Two marsupial species thought long extinct, until now known only from fossils, were found alive in New Guinea through a collaboration of scientists, indigenous communities and citizen scientists. The discovery of the pygmy long-fingered possum and the ring-tailed glider marks the first confirmation of live specimens in over 7,000 years, the Bishop Museum, a natural history museum in Honolulu, announced. The two animals are known as “Lazarus species,” a term for organisms that reappear after being thought to be extinct. “The discovery of two Lazarus species, thought to be extinct for millennia, is unprecedented,” said Australian Museum’s Dr. Tim Flannery in the press release 👇🏻⬇️more in the 1rst comments ⬇️👇🏻.

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These species were first discovered by Dr. Ken Aplin as fossils after their teeth were excavated in the 1990s during an archaeological dig in western New Guinea.

Helgen later saw a photo of the gliding ring-tailed possum in the wild, and immediately identified it as one of Aplin’s “extinct” species. Indigenous communities in the Tambrauw and Maybrat areas of West Papua aided the scientists with identification work through their knowledge of the marsupial’s “unique” lifestyle, the press release said.

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