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Duke Lemur Center

6 hours ago

This #FossilFriday meet Catopithecus! The DLC is the only place in the Western Hemisphere where you can see this little monkey 🐒 Catopithecus lived 34 million years ago in really ancient Egypt. Catopithecus is close to the common ancestor of all Old World monkeys and apes and it tells us about the origins of our big brains and short noses that separate us from lemurs. Unfortunately, this specimen is saturated with salt which can cause the fossil to disintegrate with changing temperature and humidity. This month the DLC is raising funds for an HVAC unit that will stabilize the room where we store Catopithecus.

Help us protect our primate history! www.gifts.duke.edu/lemur?designation=3912061

Learn more about the project here! lemur.duke.edu/protectprimatehistory ... See MoreSee Less

Duke Lemur Center

9 hours ago

Looking for a unique holiday gift that helps lemurs too?! Send someone you love a special delivery from the DLC’s ADOPT A LEMUR program! 🎀 Packages start at $50, and your gift helps support our lemurs' care. Order by December 15th for delivery within the U.S. by December 25th: lemur.duke.edu/adopt. ... See MoreSee Less

Duke Lemur Center

2 days ago

A HUGE THANK YOU to everyone who donated to the DLC this #GivingTuesday! 💚 We raised over $10,000 (!!), including over $1,500 in donations earmarked for our special PROTECT PRIMATE HISTORY campaign for our fossil division! Woohoo!!

And because our fossils need a whole lotta love, we're EXTENDING that giving opportunity through December 31! Between now and 12/31, all donations made via the link below will go toward our $9,200 total fundraising goal ($7,700 in addition to what y'all helped us raise yesterday -- we can do that, right?!), which will enable us to purchase a special HVAC unit to keep our most fragile fossils from crumbling.

Link to donate to PROTECT PRIMATE HISTORY here: www.gifts.duke.edu/lemur?designation=3912061.

More details (and infographics) here: lemur.duke.edu/givingtuesday.

THANK YOU again for all your support, yesterday and throughout the year! We couldn't do this without you! 💚 ... See MoreSee Less

Duke Lemur Center

3 days ago

This is just a small sample of over 35,000 fossil specimens the Duke Lemur Center is responsible for preserving for future researchers, students, and visitors. The collection includes the oldest-known aye-aye relative (Plesiopithecus), the common ancestor of monkeys and apes (Parapithecus), gorilla-sized lemurs (Megaladapis), rhino-sized carnivores (Megistotherium), and hippo-like elephants (Moeritherium). Each of these specimens preserves important clues about the origins of lemurs and humans.

Unfortunately, some of our specimens are extremely fragile and unstable. Some of them are literally crumbling to dust. We are working to preserve as much as we can as quickly as we can. You can help us create a safe, stable fossil ICU where we can precisely control the temperature and humidity surrounding these specimens.

Your #GivingTuesday donation today goes directly towards creating a space to protect our primate history. We are working to make an exhibit space in the collection so you can meet your primate relatives, but first we need to make sure the fossils survive a second dusty extinction!

LEARN MORE: lemur.duke.edu/givingtuesday

DIRECT LINK TO GIVE: www.gifts.duke.edu/?designation=3912061 ... See MoreSee Less

Duke Lemur Center

3 days ago

The Duke Lemur Center is one of the only places in the world with living lemurs and their ancient relatives in the same place. Researchers and students can travel through millions of years of adaptation, diversification, and extinction without leaving the DLC. Today for #GivingTuesday you can help make sure the fossil history of lemurs is preserved for decades to come.

Some of the oldest lemur relatives actually come from North America! Notharctus and its relatives lived on the northern continents before hopping across the ancient Mediterranean to the island-continent of Africa. There, lemur-like primates like Aframonius scrambled through the trees next to the ancient relatives of monkeys.

Aframonius comes from Quarry L-41, one of the most fossil-rich sites in Africa, and the DLC collection is the only L-41 collection outside of Egypt. The delicate fossils of Aframonius were preserved in the fine mudstone of L-41 along with salt, which can expand and flow, damaging these ancient lemur specimens. We want to build a fossil ICU to stabilize the temperature and humidity around the L-41 collection.

If you can help us stabilize the collection, generations of visitors, researchers, and students will be able to study why most lemur-like primates went extinct in Africa, but survived in Madagascar. These insights could help us save lemurs from going extinct in Madagascar, too.

DIRECT LINK TO DONATE: www.gifts.duke.edu/?designation=3912061

LEARN MORE: lemur.duke.edu/givingtuesday/ ... See MoreSee Less

Duke Lemur Center

3 days ago

Help us preserve the fossil heritage of lemurs and humans for #GivingTuesday! Some of our fossils are literally crumbing to dust. We have a highly skilled team working to protect the collection, but we need your help, too.

One reason we study lemurs is to learn more about ourselves. Lemurs and humans are primates separated by millions of years of change. We both have pretty big brains, complex social lives, and agile hands. What we learn about lemur behavior, vision, guts, and life-history can help us explore those traits in us.

When our lemur-based observations are combined with the fossil record, we can glimpse when and where key primate traits appeared…assuming the fossil survives long enough to be studied.

Unfortunately, some of the fossils at the Duke Lemur Center have salt and sulfur in them, making them very unstable. Some, like the specimen in the box, spontaneously break down. We have scans and photos of this specimen when it was intact only a year ago.

Your donation today will help us create a stable fossil ICU where we can ensure fossils are safe while we work to document and preserve them for future generations. We are also protecting the fossils for you to visit when we finally open fossil exhibit space at the Duke Lemur Center!

DIRECT LINK TO GIVE: www.gifts.duke.edu/?designation=3912061

LEARN MORE: lemur.duke.edu/givingtuesday/

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Duke Lemur Center

3 days ago

This #GivingTuesday, help us preserve and protect some of the weirdos in your family tree!

On the left is the skeleton of Palaeopropithecus, a giant sloth LEMUR from Madagascar! This crazy creature only went extinct a few centuries ago. Its closest living relatives at the Duke Lemur Center are sifaka, which also like to hang around upside down.

At the Duke Lemur Center, researchers study the locomotion of sifaka and Palaeopropithecus, comparing their anatomy to understand the diversity and ecology of this fascinating family of lemurs. Unfortunately, some of our fossils are unstable in the changing temperature and humidity of North Carolina. Your donation today will help us create an insulated "fossil ICU" at the Duke Lemur Center that will ensure researchers, students, and visitors will be able to study the collection of over 35,000 specimens for decades to come.

LEARN MORE: lemur.duke.edu/givingtuesday/

DIRECT LINK TO GIVE: www.gifts.duke.edu/?designation=3912061 ... See MoreSee Less

Duke Lemur Center

3 days ago

The DLC is home to aye-ayes. Some very cute baby aye-ayes and some very smart adult aye-ayes, but did you know we are also home to the oldest aye-ayes? --As in, 34-million-year-old aye-ayes? 😲

Plesiopithecus (the jaw and snout) was discovered by DLC researchers at Quarry L-41 in the Fayum Depression of Egypt. L-41 is one of the most fossil-rich places in Africa. It preserves small, delicate fossils. The fossils of Plesiopithecus were discovered decades ago, but were only recognized as aye-aye evidence three years ago. There are so many more discoveries waiting to be made in the L-41 collection!

Unfortunately, the rocks at L-41 are saturated with salt, making them very unstable in changing temperatures and humidity. We are working quickly to stabilize and protect the unique, irreplaceable L-41 fossils, and you can help! Your #GivingTuesday gift goes directly towards transforming the room for the L-41 collection into a fossil ICU where we can keep the specimens safe for future discoveries.

We also have subfossils of much more recent aye-ayes from Madagascar. These 600 year old specimens reveal the diversity and ecology of aye-ayes as the human population expanded on the island and agriculture spread. These ancient bones are helping Duke Lemur Center researchers understand the changing Malagasy ecosystem as humans continue to impact aye-aye habitats. There are still important discoveries to made in the drawers and in the field!

Help us protect the primate fossil record this #GivingTuesday! Please consider giving $10 to help us preserve them for future researchers, students, and visitors!

LEARN MORE: lemur.duke.edu/givingtuesday

DIRECT LINK TO GIVE: www.gifts.duke.edu/?designation=3912061 ... See MoreSee Less