🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

This study estimated body mass across the species of Smilodon using regression relationships between skeletal dimensions and body weight in living felids. The analysis confirmed that the South America…

Per Christiansen, John M. Harris · Journal of Morphology · 2005

This study recovered complete mitochondrial genomes from the dirk-toothed Smilodon and the scimitar-toothed Homotherium, allowing a genetic test of how these iconic sabertooths relate to one another a…

Johanna L. A. Paijmans, Ross Barnett, M. Thomas P. Gilbert, et al. · Current Biology · 2017

This work measured carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes in bone collagen from Rancho La Brea mammals, including the predators Smilodon and Panthera atrox alongside their herbivore prey. The isotopic si…

Joan Brenner Coltrain, John M. Harris, Thure E. Cerling, James R. Ehleringer, et al. · Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology · 2004

This overview surveys the disappearance of numerous large cats, including Smilodon, Homotherium, the American lion, the cave lion, and Miracinonyx, as part of the broader late Quaternary megafaunal ex…

This overview examines how body size influenced which carnivores survived the end-Pleistocene extinctions and which, like the great cats, did not. Large predators tend to have smaller populations, low…

This overview surveys how finite-element analysis transformed understanding of sabertooth killing mechanics by revealing an apparent paradox: animals like Smilodon had skulls poorly suited to withstan…

This overview reviews what the preserved hyoid bones of Smilodon suggest about the sounds the sabertooth may have made. In living cats, the structure of the hyoid apparatus correlates with whether a s…

This overview surveys what stable isotope and dental studies reveal about the diet of Panthera atrox. By analysing carbon and nitrogen values in the bone collagen of American lions alongside contempor…

This overview examines how stable isotope studies reveal the way coexisting Ice Age predators divided up prey and habitat. By comparing carbon and nitrogen values in the bone collagen of species such…

This overview surveys how stable isotope studies have been used to identify the prey of Smilodon at sites such as Rancho La Brea. By comparing carbon and nitrogen values in sabertooth bone collagen wi…

This overview addresses how sabertooths like Smilodon achieved the enormous gape needed to clear their elongated canines and apply them to prey. Estimates suggest the jaws could open to roughly twice…

This overview examines how radiocarbon dating is applied to the bones of late Pleistocene cats to reconstruct their chronologies and last appearances. Directly dating individual fossils of Smilodon, c…

This overview compares the killing strategies of sabertooth cats with those of conical-toothed felids such as modern lions and tigers. Living big cats typically use short, robust canines and a powerfu…

This overview surveys the stable isotope techniques used to reconstruct the diets of extinct cats. Carbon isotopes in bone and tooth collagen and enamel record whether prey fed on plants using differe…

This overview examines the record of Panthera atrox at Rancho La Brea, where the American lion is far less common than the sabertooth Smilodon but is nonetheless represented by valuable cranial and po…

This overview takes a deep-time perspective on the rise and fall of sabertooth cats, whose machairodont lineage flourished for more than ten million years before vanishing in the late Pleistocene. Aft…

This overview examines the timing of extinction among the great carnivores of Rancho La Brea, including the sabertooth Smilodon fatalis and the American lion, whose latest dated remains cluster near t…

Using finite element analysis, the authors built a high-resolution digital model of a Smilodon fatalis skull and compared its mechanical performance against a modern lion. The simulations showed that…

Colin R. McHenry, Stephen Wroe, Philip D. Clausen, Karen Moreno, Eleanor Cunningham · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2007

This influential study quantified broken teeth among large carnivores from the Rancho La Brea asphalt deposits, including Smilodon fatalis, dire wolves, American lions, and coyotes. Tooth breakage rat…

Blaire Van Valkenburgh, Fritz Hertel · Science · 1993