The fossils belong to a species named Mesrypithecus moghraensis, a find that is poised to redraw the evolutionary map of primates in Africa.
The announcement was made by Dr. Hesham Sallam, founder of the Mansoura University Vertebrate Palaeontology Centre (MUVP), on Thursday at a press conference.
Sallam noted that this discovery—the first of its kind led by an entirely Egyptian research team—provides concrete evidence of the diversity of ancient apes in North Africa, a region previously thought to lie outside their primary evolutionary range during the Early Miocene.
For years, scientific theories suggested that the origins of higher primates were largely confined to East Africa, in places like Kenya and Uganda.
The presence of Mesrypithecus in Egypt proves that North Africa held a missing piece of the puzzle, showing a much wider distribution of these ancestors than ever imagined.
The research, published in the prestigious international journal Science, utilized advanced phylogenetic analyses.
By integrating DNA data from living species with the anatomical traits of the newly found fossils, the team successfully placed Mesrypithecus near the common ancestor of all living apes.
Dr. Shrouk Al-Ashqar, a lead researcher on the project, has made history as the first female scientist from the Middle East to lead a study of this magnitude in such a high-impact journal.
Celebrating the achievement on social media, Dr. Sallam remarked that the "Sallam Lab" has presented Egypt with an unprecedented scientific achievement, recorded for the first time in the history of Egyptian universities.
This latest find cements the MUVP's reputation as a global powerhouse in paleontology, building on a decade of high-profile discoveries that have consistently made international headlines.
The team first gained worldwide acclaim in 2018 with the discovery of Mansourasaurus, a school-bus-sized dinosaur that filled a massive gap in the history of African dinosaurs. This was followed by the 2023 unveiling of Tutcetus, one of the smallest and oldest basilosaurid whales ever found, named in honor of King Tutankhamun.
The center's momentum continued into 2025 with the identification of Wadisuchus, the "Crocodile of the Valley," a species dating back 80 million years that survived the extinction of the dinosaurs.
Additionally, the discovery of Bastetodon, a 30-million-year-old carnivorous mammal, provided vital insights into the early predators of prehistoric Egypt.
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