In a paper published in the latest issue of Vertebrata PalAsiatica, Dr. ZHANG Jiangyong, Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP), Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Dr. Mark Wilson, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Alberta, reported a new species of osteoglossid fish, Scleropages sinensis sp. nov., from the Early Eocene Xiwanpu Formation in Hunan and the Yangxi Formation in Hubei, China. The discovery of Scleropages sinensis dates the divergence of Scleropages and Osteoglossum as at least old as the Early Eocene, which is a significant step toward solving this zoogeographical puzzle.

In a study published March 3 in Science, paleontologists from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP), Chinese Academy of Sciences and their collaborators reported two early Late Pleistocene (~105,000- to 125,000-year-old) crania from Lingjing, Xuchang, China. They exhibit a morphological mosaic with differences from and similarities to their western contemporaries. This morphological combination reflects Pleistocene human evolutionary patterns in general biology, as well as both regional continuity and interregional population dynamics.

In a study published October 20 in Science, paleontologists from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP), Chinese Academy of Sciences and Uppsala University in Sweden reported a second Silurian maxillate placoderm, Qilinyu rostrate, which bridges the gnathal and maxillate conditions. Researchers proposed that the maxilla, premaxilla, and dentary are homologous to the gnathal plates of placoderms and that all belong to the same dental arcade, and the gnathal-maxillate transformation occurred concurrently in upper and lower jaws, predating the addition of infradentary bones to the lower jaw.