multituberculate

[muhl-tee-too-bur-kyuh-lit, -leyt, -tyoo-, muhl-tahy-]

noun

1. a rodentlike mammal of the extinct order Multituberculata, which lived from the late Jurassic Period to the Oligocene Epoch, reaching the size of a woodchuck and having molars with two or three rows of simple pointed cusps.

adjective

1. of or relating to the multituberculates.

2. having teeth with many simple, pointed cusps.

Word History and Origins

Origin of multituberculate¹

From New Latin Multituberculata (1884); multi-, tuberculate, -ata ¹

Example Sentences

It contributed to the unmatched longevity of the multituberculate lineage, and it facilitated group diversification by enabling multituberculates to use plants as a food source at a time in prehistory when other mammals mainly ate insects or small vertebrates.

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Earliest evolution of multituberculate mammals revealed by a new Jurassic fossil.

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Meng, J. & Wyss, A. R. Monotreme affinities and low-frequency hearing suggested by multituberculate ear.

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Rougier, G. W., Wible, J. R. & Novacek, M. J. Middle-ear ossicles of the multituberculate Kryptobaatar from the Mongolian Late Cretaceous: implications for mammaliamorph relationships and the evolution of the auditory apparatus.

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They were characteristic of multituberculate mammals, rodent-like creatures that lived with dinosaurs for more than 100 million years.

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