What are the concentration of eccrine body glands in diverse mammal groups? According to the littoral dispersal theory (Pleistocene Homo following coasts & rivers), one of the functions of eccrine sweating in littoral human ancestors (feeding on shellfish etc.) might have been the excretion of salt. Sweating all over the body is unlikely in cursorial mammals (e.g. water & salt are scarce in savannas), but overheated furseals on land sweat thermoregulatorily through abundant apocrine &/or eccrine sweat glands on their naked hind-flippers. Most mammals have eccrine glands on palms & soles. AFAIK, apes & catarrhini also have body sweat glands (though less than humans), but I don't know about platyrrhini & other primates.
Mammals are endothermic and homeothermic vertebrates whose bodies are maintained according to the environmental fluctuations by the systems. One group of therapsids, the cynodonts, gave rise during the Triassic to therians devoid of this, property. Mammals possess following skin glands: sweat glands (eccrine and apocrine), scent glands.Sweat glands are located over most of the body surface in primates. Apocrine glands, or scent glands, secrete substances that are used for chemical communication, such as in skunks. Mammary glands produce milk that is used to feed newborns. While male monotremes and eutherians possess mammary glands, male marsupials do not. Mammary glands likely are modified sebaceous or eccrine glands, but their evolutionary origin is not entirely clear. Most mammals have eccrine glands on palms & soles. AFAIK, apes & catarrhini also have body sweat glands (though less than humans), platyrrhini & other primates also possess eccrine glands either clear or degenerated.
Thank you very much, Ravi. Do you know whether non-catarrhine primates have eccrines on their bodies? Most mammals don't have body eccrines, but do you know whether there are non-primate mammals with body eccrines?
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