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单词 Proboscidea
释义
Proboscidea

Biology
  • The order of mammals that comprises the elephants. They are herbivorous, with a muscular trunk (proboscis) used for drinking, bathing, and collecting food. The tusks are continuously growing upper incisors and the enormous ridged molar teeth are produced in sequence to replace worn teeth throughout life. The order, which evolved in the Eocene epoch, was formerly much larger and more widespread than it is today and included the extinct mammoths. Two species of modern elephants are generally recognized, the African elephant (Loxodonta africana) and Asian elephant (Elephas maximus), although there is evidence that there may be an additional African species, the forest elephant (L. cyclotis). The African elephant is now classed as ‘vulnerable’ and the Asian elephant as ‘endangered’, due to a combination of poaching and habitat loss.


Geology and Earth Sciences
  • Order comprising the elephants and their extinct relatives, e.g. mastodons (see mammutidae), gomphotheres (see gomphotheriidae), and mammoths (see mammuthus). The order was formerly highly successful and occupied the Americas, Eurasia, and Africa. Proboscideans tend toward large size. Since the late Miocene most have possessed a long trunk: this is developed from the nose and upper lip. Teeth are reduced in number, young adults having three molars in each side of each jaw; these are used one at a time, old teeth being shed and replaced by those behind. The upper incisors are enlarged to form tusks. The jaw muscles are large, and the skull short and high. The vertebrae and up to 20 ribs carry the weight of the abdomen, which is balanced on the fore limbs by the weight of the head, the hind limbs providing propulsion. The brain is well developed. Parental care of the young is prolonged, and social organization is complex.


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