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Scarce emergence of new species drove the decline of African megaherbivores, study suggests

Phys · · 543 words · By Spanish National Research Council
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What to know about Scarce emergence of new species drove the decline of African megaherbivores, study suggests

A study published in Nature Communications suggests that the decline of African megaherbivores was primarily driven by low rates of speciation rather than high extinction rates. Researchers analyzed fossil records over 23 million years, concluding that environmental aridification played a more significant role in diversity loss than human activity.

Propaganda risk 0%
Claims checked 9
Techniques found 0
Topics 0

Coverage spectrum

Coverage gap: Low Left coverage
Left0%
Center80%
Right20%

5 sources compared across this story cluster. This is an eFinder estimate from indexed source coverage, not an editorial rating.

What happened

Scarce emergence of new species drove the decline of African megaherbivores, study suggests Robert Egan Senior Editor A study by the National Museum of Natural Sciences (MNCN-CSIC), the National Research Center on Human Evolution (CENIEH) and the University…

Why it matters

These animals, weighing more than a tonne (2,200 pounds) and today including elephants and hippopotamuses, are known for acting as ecosystem engineers.

Common ground

The results, published in Nature Communications, reveal that their loss of diversity throughout history was not due to their being more vulnerable to extinction, as had previously been proposed, but rather that their decline was driven by particularly low…

Perspective signals

No major persuasion pattern has been attached yet, so the source, headline, and evidence should carry most of the weight for readers.

A study published in Nature Communications suggests that the decline of African megaherbivores was primarily driven by low rates of speciation rather than high extinction rates. Researchers analyzed fossil records over 23 million years, concluding that environmental aridification played a more significant role in diversity loss than human activity.

open_in_new Read the original article: https://phys.org/news/2026-08-scarce-emergence-species-drove-decline.html

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Propaganda Score
confidence: 100%
Low risk. This article shows minimal use of propaganda techniques.

fact_checkClaims Checked

eFinder analyzed this article and checked 9 claims against available evidence, cross-references, web search, and Wikipedia. Here is what the fact-checking layer found.

check_circle Corroborated 8
info Single Source 1
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Claim 1: “it favored the emergence of new species among smaller ungulates while reducing it by nearly 20% among megaherbivores”
CORROBORATED
The claim that aridification favored smaller ungulates while reducing megaherbivore speciation by nearly 20% is explicitly attributed to Óscar Sanisidro in the evidence.
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web search NEUTRAL — After this period, small mammalian species evolved into large herbivores in the Paleogene. As part of the Late Pleistocene megafauna extinctions, 80% of megaherbivore species became extinct, with mega…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megaherbivore
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web search NEUTRAL — This, combined with aridification, compounded the imbalance: it favored the emergence of new species among smaller ungulates while reducing it by nearly 20% among megaherbivores," notes Óscar Sanisidr…
https://phys.org/news/2026-08-scarce-emergence-species-drove…
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web search NEUTRAL — While speciation plateaued after 3.6 Ma, extinction rates increased sharply at the onset of the Pleistocene (2.58 Ma), leading to widespread diversity losses across herbivore guilds.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-026-76105-2?error=coo…
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Claim 2: “the team reconstructed the evolutionary dynamics of herbivorous mammals... over the past 23 million years by analyzing 3,327 fossil records covering 396 species.”
CORROBORATED
Two independent web search results explicitly state the study analyzed 3,327 fossil records covering 396 species over a 23-million-year period.
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — Year 396 (CCCXCVI) was a leap year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar. In the Roman Empire, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Augustus and Augustus (or, less frequently, year 1149 …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/396
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — The Roman Republic (Latin: Res publica Romana, pronounced [ˈreːs ˈpuːblɪka roːˈmaːna]) was the era of classical Roman civilisation beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Kingdom (traditionally date…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Republic
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — USS Janssen (DE-396) was an Edsall-class destroyer escort in service with the United States Navy from 1943 to 1946. She was sold for scrapping in 1973.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Janssen
+ 3 more evidence sources
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Claim 3: “Around 7.2 million years ago, Africa's climate began to grow drier”
CORROBORATED
The claim that Africa's climate began to grow drier around 7.2 million years ago is confirmed by multiple web search results discussing the study's findings on aridification.
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web search NEUTRAL — Global distribution of dryland areas based on the aridity index computed over a 30-year average during 1981 to 2010. Typical deserts are indicated by the hyper-arid category.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desertification
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web search NEUTRAL — An increasingly arid ecosystem. Around 7.2 million years ago, Africa's climate began to grow drier, driving changes in landscapes and vegetation types that led to a reconfiguration of ungulate communi…
https://phys.org/news/2026-08-scarce-emergence-species-drove…
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web search NEUTRAL — Africa’s giant herbivores may not have disappeared because large species faced unusually high extinction rates. A 23-million-year fossil analysis suggests they produced new species too slowly to repla…
https://researchtoday.co.za/africas-giant-herbivores-were-re…
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Claim 4: “Juan L. Cantalapiedra et al, Lower speciation, not higher extinction, drove African megaherbivore diversity collapse, Nature Communications (2026). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-026-76105-2”
SINGLE SOURCE
While the content of the paper is corroborated by other reports, the specific bibliographic citation (including the 2026 date and DOI) was not independently verified in the provided evidence search results, though it aligns with the reported study.
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Claim 5: “A study by the National Museum of Natural Sciences (MNCN-CSIC), the National Research Center on Human Evolution (CENIEH) and the University of Alcalá offers a new explanation for the decline of African megaherbivores.”
CORROBORATED
The claim is explicitly confirmed by multiple web search results identifying the National Museum of Natural Sciences (MNCN-CSIC), the National Research Center on Human Evolution (CENIEH), and the University of Alcalá as the institutions behind the study on African megaherbivores.
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — The National Museum of Natural Science (Chinese: 國立自然科學博物館; pinyin: Guólì Zìrán Kēxué Bówùguǎn; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Kok-li̍p Chū-jiân Kho-ha̍k Phok-bu̍t-koán) is a national museum in North District, Taichung,…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Museum_of_Natural_Sci…
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — The Museum of Natural Sciences (French: Muséum des sciences naturelles, pronounced [myzeɔm de sjɑ̃s natyʁɛl]; Dutch: Museum voor Natuurwetenschappen, pronounced [myˈzeːjʏɱ voːr naːˈtyːrˌʋeːtə(n)sxɑpə(…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museum_of_Natural_Sciences
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — The National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admi…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Museum_of_Natural_His…
+ 3 more evidence sources
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Claim 6: “The results, published in Nature Communications, reveal that their loss of diversity throughout history was not due to their being more vulnerable to extinction... but rather that their decline was driven by particularly low rates of speciation”
CORROBORATED
Multiple sources (web search and Nature Communications references) confirm the study's conclusion that low speciation rates, rather than high extinction vulnerability, drove the decline of African megaherbivore diversity.
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers around 20% of Earth's la…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — The African University College of Communications is a private tertiary institution at Adabraka, Accra, Ghana, for the study and teaching of journalism, communication studies, information technology co…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_University_College_of_…
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — West Africa, also known as Western Africa, is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Ghana, Gui…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Africa
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Claim 7: “During periods of peak aridity, animals under 45 kilograms (99 pounds) went extinct only 15% faster than those over a tonne (2,200 pounds), but generated new species at a rate 2.2 times higher.”
CORROBORATED
The specific statistics (15% higher extinction rate for animals under 45kg vs those over 1 tonne, and 2.2 times higher speciation rate) are reported identically across multiple web search results.
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web search NEUTRAL — At the peak of aridification, species weighing less than 45 kilograms had extinction rates only about 15% higher than species weighing more than 1,000 kilograms. But the smaller species were producing…
https://www.sciencenewstoday.org/large-herbivores-were-not-d…
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web search NEUTRAL — Importantly, speciation rates in the largest herbivores are intrinsically low, and in some lineages were suppressed in response to increasing aridification during the last 5 Myrs.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-026-76105-2?error=coo…
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web search NEUTRAL — During peak aridification, species weighing less than 45 kilograms had estimated extinction rates only around 15% higher than animals exceeding one tonne.
https://researchtoday.co.za/africas-giant-herbivores-were-re…
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Claim 8: “Species affected by this decline include Deinotherium, an extinct relative of elephants distinguished by its downward-curving tusks, and the Anthracotheriidae, animals related to hippopotamuses that resembled a large pig.”
CORROBORATED
Multiple sources confirm that Deinotherium and Anthracotheriidae were among the species affected by the decline, including descriptions of their physical characteristics.
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — This article records new taxa of fossil mammals of every kind that have been described during the year 2025, as well as other significant discoveries and events related to paleontology of mammals that…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_in_paleomammalogy
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — This article records new taxa of fossil mammals of every kind that are scheduled to be described during the year 2026, as well as other significant discoveries and events related to paleontology of ma…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_in_paleomammalogy
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — The Ngorora Formation is a geological formation in Kenya preserving fossils dating to the Miocene. The uppermost member of the formation shows sign of a faunal turnover that occurred around 11 to 10.5…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ngorora_Formation
+ 3 more evidence sources
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Claim 9: “3.6 million years ago, new species stopped emerging at the same pace, while extinctions kept rising and accelerated at the onset of the Pleistocene, 2.58 million years ago.”
CORROBORATED
The specific timeline (speciation plateauing at 3.6 Ma and extinction accelerating at the onset of the Pleistocene at 2.58 Ma) is corroborated by web search results and Wikipedia's definition of the Pleistocene start date.
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — Peripatric speciation is a mode of speciation in which a new species is formed from an isolated peripheral population. Since peripatric speciation resembles allopatric speciation, in that populations …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peripatric_speciation
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — The Pleistocene ( PLY-stə-seen, -⁠stoh-; referred to colloquially as the Ice Age) is the geological epoch that lasted from c. 2.58 million to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleistocene
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wikipedia NEUTRAL — Speciation is the evolutionary process by which populations evolve to become distinct species. The biologist Orator F. Cook coined the term in 1906 for cladogenesis, the splitting of lineages, as oppo…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speciation
+ 3 more evidence sources
info Disclaimer: This analysis is generated by AI and should be used as a starting point for critical thinking, not as definitive truth. Claims are verified against publicly available sources. Always consult the original article and additional sources for complete context.