Call it an unfinished story, but with a plot that's a grabber. It's the tale of an ancient land mammal making its way back to the sea, becoming the forerunner of today's whales. In doing so, it ...

This story appears in the August 2010 issue of National Geographic magazine. Thirty-seven million years ago, in the waters of the prehistoric Tethys Ocean, a sinuous, 50-foot-long beast with ...

Analyzing the anatomy of early fossil cetaceans in the context of modern mammals to understand the evolution of cetaceans from terrestrial ancestors. The evolution of modern cetaceans (including ...

Whales are weird. The Cetacea clade contains the largest animal to ever live—the blue whale—as well as other gigantic baleen whales and a diverse array of toothed whales, including dolphins, porpoises ...

Understanding human evolution through the study of whale evolution Brief definition and history of mammals How did land-based mammals return to the sea? Fossils from "transitional species" trace ...

A recent study by Stony Brook University postdoctoral fellow Mason Youngblood revealed the complex efficiency of whale ...

Alberto GennariThe Peregocetus pacificus was well-adapted to both land and sea environments. Scientists have discovered evidence of a 42 million-year-old whale species on the coast of Peru.

Early ancestors of the ocean's biggest animals once walked on land. Follow their extraordinary journey from shore to sea. Although whales are expert swimmers and perfectly adapted to life underwater, ...