For decades, it was assumed that bats had originated in Asia, Africa or somewhere in the Americas. A new study now calls that idea into question. According to its authors, the lineage arose around 65 million years ago in Europe, from where it spread to colonise the rest of the planet. In other words, the first bat species dates back to the age of the dinosaurs.
The research, the most comprehensive carried out to date on this group of mammals, combines the genome sequencing of 103 species with the study of 44 fossils. The work forms part of Bat1K, an international consortium devoted to gathering genomic information on bats, and has been published in the journal "Nature" (source in Spanish). On the Spanish side, researchers from the National Museum of Natural Sciences (MNCN-CSIC) and the University of Granada have taken part.
