Overview
- The peer-reviewed paper, published Wednesday, August 5, 2026, used high-resolution CT scans to create digital endocasts from three dodo skulls, including the only two complete skulls in museum collections.
- Researchers found the dodo’s forebrain, the region tied to cognition and memory, was similar in proportion to modern pigeons, giving no anatomical reason to call the species less intelligent.
- Anatomical signals such as relatively large eyes, small optic lobes, and an enlarged olfactory region suggest possible crepuscular or nocturnal habits and greater reliance on smell and touch, but the authors call these behavioral links tentative.
- The team released the scan data and used specimens from major museums to boost reproducibility, while stressing that endocasts infer brain regions indirectly and cannot by themselves prove behavior.
- The study reframes the dodo’s legacy by shifting the cause of its extinction from alleged stupidity to island tameness and rapid pressure from human hunting and introduced mammals, and it opens new avenues for reexamining extinct species.