Orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus)
The orangutans are the two exclusively Asian species of extant great apes. Native to Indonesia and Malaysia, orangutans are currently found in only the rainforests of Borneo and Sumatra. Classified in the genus Pongo, orangutans were considered to be one species. However, since 1996, they have been divided into two species: the Bornean orangutan (P. pygmaeus) and the Sumatran orangutan (P. abelii). In addition, the Bornean species is divided into three subspecies. The orangutans are also the only surviving species of the subfamily Ponginae, which also included several other species, such as the three extinct species of the genus Gigantopithecus, including the largest known primate Gigantopithecus blacki. Both extant species had their genomes sequenced and they appear to have diverged around 400,000 years ago. Orangutans diverged from the rest of the great apes 15.7 to 19.3 million years ago (mya).
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Marc Herbin, curator of the Vertebrate Brain Collection of the Jardin de Plantes, Paris - France.Mathieu Santin, Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle, CENIR, UMR-S975, Inserm U975, CNRS UMR7225, Paris - France