Drying and dying in Australia: extraordinary creatures and climate change 15 million years ago

1500万年前，澳大利亚的全球独特的哺乳动物面临着从郁郁葱葱的温室到干燥冰库条件的气候骤降。在北方昆士兰州，在被列为世界遗产的AL90洞穴中，富含化石的沉积物跨越了这一变化的间隔。被埋葬的是几十个保存非常完好的头骨和关节骨骼，包括一个从幼年到成年的生长系列，一种罕见的，可能是树懒一样的有袋动物，以及更熟悉的袋鼠，袋狼和蝙蝠。我们的化石研究将有助于使澳大利亚的生物变化记录与全球古气候事件保持一致，并为测量继续改变我们国家的环境和生物变化的性质和速度提供基准。

Australia's globally distinctive mammals were confronted 15 million years ago by a climate plunge from lush greenhouse to dry icehouse conditions. In northern Queensland, in the World Heritage-listed cave known as AL90, fossil-rich deposits span this interval of change. Entombed are dozens of extraordinarily well-preserved skulls and articulated skeletons including a growth series from pouch-young to adults of a rare, possibly sloth-like marsupial as well as more familiar kangaroos, thylacines and bats. Our fossil research will help align Australian records of biotic change with global palaeoclimatic events and provide a benchmark for measuring the nature and rate of environmental and biotic change that continues to transform our nation.