The largest combined study to date of bat genomes and fossils concludes that bats most likely originated in Europe around 65 million years ago and that echolocation and flight had already developed at the very beginning of bat evolution. A team from Ulm Universität is also involved in the study, published in Nature: the researchers sequenced the genomes of four of the 42 bat species newly analysed. The findings lay the foundation stone for research into the extraordinary longevity and disease resistance of bats.
Bats are among the most extraordinary mammals on Earth: they are the only mammals capable of true active flight, and they navigate and hunt in complete darkness using echolocation alone. Furthermore, many bat species display remarkable resistance to disease and reach an age that is exceptionally high for their size. With more than 1,500 species found worldwide, bats account for one-fifth of all living mammals and play a crucial role in maintaining healthy ecosystems by pollinating plants, dispersing seeds and consuming large quantities of pests.
Yet despite their extraordinary biology and ecological importance, researchers have for decades been puzzling over various questions regarding their evolution: Where do bats come from? How are the bat families related to one another? When did the ability to fly and echolocation first emerge? And how did bats develop the unusual characteristics that distinguish them from other mammals?
Now, a study provides answers to some of these long-standing questions and paves the way for investigating unresolved issues. An international team of 137 scientists from 64 countries, with the participation of Ulm University, has analysed genomic and fossil samples using novel methods and revised the evolutionary tree of bats. The researchers were able to show that bats – and thus flight in mammals – most likely evolved in Europe around 65 million years ago. The findings refute earlier hypotheses that assumed an Asian, African or North American origin.
“The approach we used to jointly model the evolution of fossil and living species can achieve what other methods cannot: identify the oldest group of fossil bats by taking genomic data into account and reveal when and where bats first emerged,” says Professor Liliana M. Dávalos of Stony Brook University (New York, USA), lead author of the study.
The team, working together as part of the Bat1K consortium, compiled the largest collection to date of high-quality bat genomes, comprising 103 species and representing each of the 21 families of bats that have received recognition: from the tiny bumblebee bats of Thailand and Myanmar, considered the world’s smallest mammals, to the Madagascan suction-disc bats, which cling to smooth leaves using their suction cups. Compiling the dataset required samples collected over decades from all over the world. “We combined state-of-the-art DNA sequencing with computer-aided methods to generate and compare these genomes and to identify the genes they contain,” says Professor Michael Hiller of theSenckenberg Research Institute in Frankfurt, the lead author. This data was combined with that from 44 fossil bat specimens from around the world to reconstruct their evolutionary history.
Under the headship of Professor Simone Sommer from the Institute of Evolutionary Ecology and Conservation Genomics at Ulm University, Dr Magdalena Meyer and Dr Dominik Melville sequenced the genomes of four species of round-leaf-nosed bats. PhD student Bismark Opoku collected the relevant samples from species-rich bat caves in Ghana. Three of these species are known to be hosts for coronaviruses; the ecology of the fourth species (Hipposideros jonesi) is currently being investigated by Bismark Opoku. The lead researchers from the Bat1K consortium then compiled the sequencing data to re-map the bats’ phylogeny. “The new bat genomes represent a milestone for exciting research that will revolutionise our understanding of immunology, adaptation and evolution,” said Dr Magdalena Meyer.
The genomic resource created for this study provides scientists, for the first time, with a solid evolutionary framework for genetic analysis. This work could ultimately also enrich research in humans in the fields of ageing, immunity and disease resistance.
About Bat1K
The Bat1K Consortium is an international initiative dedicated to the creation and analysis of reference-quality genome assemblies for all living bat species. This study represents Phase 1 of the project.
Publication reference:
Morales, A.E., Liang, Y., Thomas, W.R. et al. Reference genomes and fossils revise bat family phylogeny and biogeography. Nature 658, 141–152 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-11007-3
Further information: Dr Dominik Melville, Institute of Evolutionary Ecology and Conversation Genomics, Ulm University, email: dominikwerner.schmid@uni-ulm.de
Text and media enquiries: Christine Liebhardt or pressestelle(at)uni-ulm.de