[Taxacom] a parasite-host pair which survived the end-Cretaceous extinction

[Kenneth Kinman]

Dear All, 
      Here is an interesting evolutionary question posed on
DML (Dinosaur Mailing List), not about dinosaurs, but actually about
lice on early mammals. I suspect the host in question was probably a
relatively early (Upper Cretaceous) member of clade Afrotheria which had
already evolved relatively thick skin and that these lice later got
transferred from primitive elephants (or their relatives) to wart-hogs
during the Cenozoic (once wart-hogs had evolved).     
         The question is what was the nature of the
Cretaceous afrotherian which survived the end-Cretaceous extinction
event and carried those specialized lice with them.  Perhaps it was the
immediate ancestor of the Paleocene genus Eritherium (earliest known
elephant ancestor, which was only recently described in 2009 in PNAS)?
Or did other early afrotherian taxa (with relatively thick skin) exist
in the Upper Cretaceous that could have played such a role and survived
the end-Cretaceous extinction event?  
             --------Ken Kinman

http://dml.cmnh.org/2011Apr/msg00079.html 

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