2023 Spring Festival Gala mascot "Rabbit Yuanyuan" officially debuts

The furry appearance, the lively and healing cuteness, the big eyes with clear layers, the oriental expression of "all things are animistic"... On December 22, the mascot image of the China Central Radio and Television Station's "2023 Spring Festival Gala" "Rabbit Yuanyuan" "Official debut. This is also the first Spring Festival Gala mascot IP in the 40-year history of the Spring Festival Gala that incorporates the preferences of countless audiences and is generated through systematic and detailed big data research.

But if you think this is just a cute little cute thing, then you may have underestimated it. The real doorway of "Rabbit Yuanyuan" is hidden in its iconic four front teeth.

"Anhui Model Rat Rabbit" is the earliest lagomorph found in the world so far. It lived in the Early Paleocene Epoch 62 million years ago. It is taken from the ecological restoration image of the "Anhui model rat rabbit" fossil discovered by scientists from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences (hereinafter referred to as the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology). It has a typical "rabbit ancestor" that dates back about 62 million years. The characteristics also hint at important clues to a classic scientific issue in lagomorph research over the past 300 years.

Are Rabbit and Rat the same family?

In life, whenever you see rabbits, they always look busy and chewing food all the time. This is because the rabbit's incisors will continue to grow, and if they cannot grind their teeth sufficiently, they will grow outward quickly. Excessively long incisors will make it impossible for the rabbit's lip to close, and the rabbit will not be able to eat normally, and in severe cases, it will lead to death.

For rabbits, they spend their lives grinding their teeth. For scientists, this is also important for the incisors. Li Qian, a researcher at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology, told China Science News that this is the iconic feature that distinguishes rabbits from other mammals.

However, among mammals, in addition to rabbits, there are also rats that have incisors that grow throughout their lives, so rabbits and rats have always been considered to be closely related. Li Qian mentioned that as early as 1735, Linnaeus, the founder of modern taxonomy and naturalist, included rabbits and rats together as rodents.

"It wasn't until 200 years later that some scientists began to point out the difference in the shape of the incisors of rabbits and mice. Moreover, there is a pair of small incisors hidden behind the large incisors in the upper jaw of lagomorphs, which is obviously more complicated than rodents. Not only that, more and more people Scholars discovered more differences between the two and came to propose that rabbits and rats are not related.”

This debate has lasted for nearly 100 years, and has also led to a classic scientific question in the history of lagomorph research: In the history of life evolution, where does the rabbit fit in the large family tree of mammals?

"Searching for roots and asking about ancestors" is a specialty of paleontologists. If you want to know how lagomorphs originated and whether they are related to rodents, the only way is to find clues from fossils.

The model rat rabbit and the Oriental dawn rat are born from the same "root"

Since the 1960s, the Chinese Academy of Sciences has organized large-scale "red bed" expeditions in South China, and discovered Asia's unique mammal groups in the Paleocene strata. This provides an opportunity to explore the origin of rodents and lagomorphs.

In the 1970s, the field expedition team of the Institute of Vertebral Paleology discovered several important skull fossils at the same level in the Qianshan Mountains of Anhui (early Paleocene, about 62 million years ago), with large incisors preserved on them. After research by Li Chuankui, a Chinese paleontologist and researcher at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology, they were named Anhui model rat rabbit and Oriental rat rat.

The first time he saw the specimen of the model rat rabbit, Li Chuankui, who had "fiery eyes", humorously said to himself: "Rabbit? Rabbit mother?" Later, after detailed morphological research, he discovered the characteristics of the Anhui model rat rabbit. Very similar to rabbits, it is suggested that it may be the ancestor type of lagomorphs. The Oriental Oriental Rat may already have the unique "gnawing" function of rodents, which is close to the ancestral type of rodents.

"More importantly, the study also found that there are many intertwined characteristics between the two. The ancestral type of rabbits and rats is 'you have me, and I have you'." Li Qian added.

The long-debated origins of lagomorphs and rodents have found their respective "roots" in Qianshan, Anhui. Some people joked that this truly shows that "the pika and the rabbit are all members of the same family": even the oldest fossils are preserved together.

In 1980, Li Chuankui brought his research on the model rat rabbit and the Oriental Oriental Oriental Rat to the "International Academic Conference on the Origin of Rodentia" held at the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh, USA. At that time, he proposed the idea that "rats and rabbits have the same origin", which attracted widespread attention in the international academic community.

Before the 20th century, paleontologists mainly judged the genetic relationships of biological groups based on the morphological characteristics of fossils. After the rapid development of molecular biology, the evidence became more and more abundant.

In 2005, Asher et al. published an article in Science magazine. They combined the morphological characteristics data of fossil and living lagomorphs with molecular biology data and found that in the early Cenozoic, the ancestral type of lagomorphs was exactly the same. Along with rodents, they diverged from other placental animals. This research is also supported by the results of big data matrix analysis in 2013. The ancestral groups of lagomorphs and rodents did not separate as sisters until the beginning of the Cenozoic Era, and each embarked on an independent evolutionary path.

At this point, it can be concluded that "rat and rabbit have the same origin". The debate over the origin of rabbits has finally come to an end.

"Rabbit Yuanyuan" = Chinese science story + Chinese traditional culture

Li Chuankui played an important role in helping Rabbit find his ancestors. In addition to the Anhui model rat rabbit, in 1965, he studied the Eocene lagomorph fossils in northern my country, including the earliest and most primitive lagomorph in the world at that time - Luohe Lu's rabbit (about 4600 years ago) 10,000 to 43 million years ago); in 2007, he and his team discovered the ancient Dawson's Rabbit (about 53 million years ago) in the Early Eocene strata of the Erlian Basin in Inner Mongolia, my country, which is between the model pika and the rabbit. The rabbit among animals broke the chronological record of the Luohe rabbit and was awarded the title of "the world's first rabbit"...

It is precisely because of the research team led by the older generation of paleontologists who have been running in the mountains and Gobi desert of the motherland for decades, filling in the blanks step by step, that our country has almost complete fossil evidence of rabbit evolution.

It can be said that the mascot of the 2023 Spring Festival Gala "Rabbit Yuanyuan" not only contains the meaning and beauty of the zodiac rabbit, but also makes the outstanding scientific research achievements and tenacious scientific spirit of Chinese scientists shine.

(Originally published in "China Science News" 2022-12-23 Page 1 Important News)

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