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Chinlechelys
''Chinlechelys'' ( meaning ''Chinle turtle'') is an extinct genus of stem-turtle belonging to Testudinata. It lived in the Norian age of the Late Triassic and is the oldest turtle known from North America. Among turtles it is unique, mostly because of its very thin shell. The type and only species, ''C. tenertesta'', was named and described with the genus by Walter G. Joyce ''et al.'' in 2009. It was probably terrestrial, and was found by Joyce ''et al.'' to be closely related to '' Proganochelys'', another terrestrial testudinatan. Discovery and naming ''Chinlechelys'' is known from only one assigned specimen, the holotype NMMNH P-16697 (New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science) recovered from the Norian Bull Canyon Formation (New Mexico, United States). The skeleton consists of the middle of the carapace, the left hypoplastron, rear ribs, a neck spine, isolated osteoderms, and portions of the bridge. The materials were collected separately over several years ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
2009 In Paleontology
Arthropods Cephalopods Three new species of extinct octopus, Octopoda discovered in 2009. The species – ''Keuppia hyperbolaris'', ''Keuppia levante'', and ''Styletoctopus annae'' – lived about 95 million years ago, and bear a strong resemblance to modern octopuses, suggesting that the Octopoda order has remained relatively unchanged for tens of millions of years. The fossils included evidence of cephalopod arm, arms, muscles, rows of suckers, cephalopod ink, ink, and internal gills. The discovery was made by a team led by Dirk Fuchs of the Freie University, which is located at Berlin, Germany.Rare fossil octopuses found NBC News, March 18, 2009 The fossils were found at Hakel and Hadjoula, Lebanon. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Proganochelys
''Proganochelys'' is an extinct, primitive stem-turtle that has been hypothesized to be the sister taxon to all other turtles creating a monophyletic group, the ''Casichelydia''. ''Proganochelys'' was named by Georg Baur in 1887 as the oldest turtle in existence at the time. The name ''Proganochelys'' comes from the Greek word ''ganos'' meaning 'brightness', combined with prefix ''pro'', 'before', and Greek base ''chelys'' meaning 'turtle'. ''Proganochelys'' is believed to have been around 1 meter in size and herbivorous in nature. ''Proganochelys'' was known as the most primitive stem-turtle for over a century, until the novel discovery of ''Odontochelys'' in 2008. ''Odontochelys'' and ''Proganochelys'' share unique primitive features that are not found in ''Casichelydia'', such as teeth on the pterygoid and vomer and a plate-like coracoid. ''Proganochelys'' is the oldest stem-turtle species with a complete shell discovered to date, known from fossils found in Germany, Switzerla ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Testudinata
Testudinata is the group of all tetrapods with a true turtle shell. It includes both modern turtles (Testudines) and many of their extinct, shelled relatives (stem-turtles). Though it was first coined as the group containing turtles by Jacob Theodor Klein in 1760, it was first defined in the modern sense by Joyce and colleagues in 2004. Testudinata does not include the primitive stem-turtle ''Odontochelys'', which only had the bottom half of a shell. A recent phylogenetic tree of Testudinata included Angolachelonia and Testudines Turtles are an order of reptiles known as Testudines, characterized by a special shell developed mainly from their ribs. Modern turtles are divided into two major groups, the Pleurodira (side necked turtles) and Cryptodira (hidden necked t ... as sister-taxa and subgroups of Testudinata. Classification The cladogram below follows an analysis by Jérémy Anquetin in 2012. References {{Taxonbar, from=Q16114972 Reptile taxonomy Norian f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Late Triassic
The Late Triassic is the third and final epoch (geology), epoch of the Triassic geologic time scale, Period in the geologic time scale, spanning the time between annum, Ma and Ma (million years ago). It is preceded by the Middle Triassic Epoch and followed by the Early Jurassic Epoch. The corresponding series (stratigraphy), series of rock beds is known as the Upper Triassic. The Late Triassic is divided into the Carnian, Norian and Rhaetian Geologic time scale, Ages. Many of the first dinosaurs evolved during the Late Triassic, including ''Plateosaurus'', ''Coelophysis'', and ''Eoraptor''. The Triassic–Jurassic extinction event began during this epoch and is one of the five major mass extinction events of the Earth. Etymology The Triassic was named in 1834 by Friedrich August von Namoh, Friedrich von Alberti, after a succession of three distinct rock layers (Greek meaning 'triad') that are widespread in southern Germany: the lower Buntsandstein (colourful sandstone'')'', t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chinle Group
The Chinle Formation is an Upper Triassic continental geological formation of fluvial, lacustrine, and palustrine to eolian deposits spread across the U.S. states of Nevada, Utah, northern Arizona, western New Mexico, and western Colorado. In New Mexico, it is often raised to the status of a geological group, the Chinle Group. Some authors have controversially considered the Chinle to be synonymous to the Dockum Group of eastern Colorado and New Mexico, western Texas, the Oklahoma panhandle, and southwestern Kansas. The Chinle Formation is part of the Colorado Plateau, Basin and Range, and the southern section of the Interior Plains.GEOLEX database entry for Chinle USGS (viewed 19 March 2006) A probable separate depositional basin within the Chinle is found in northwestern Colorado and northeastern Ut ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Neural Spine
The spinal column, a defining synapomorphy shared by nearly all vertebrates,Hagfish are believed to have secondarily lost their spinal column is a moderately flexible series of vertebrae (singular vertebra), each constituting a characteristic irregular bone whose complex structure is composed primarily of bone, and secondarily of hyaline cartilage. They show variation in the proportion contributed by these two tissue types; such variations correlate on one hand with the cerebral/caudal rank (i.e., location within the backbone), and on the other with phylogenetic differences among the vertebrate taxa. The basic configuration of a vertebra varies, but the bone is its ''body'', with the central part of the body constituting the ''centrum''. The upper (closer to) and lower (further from), respectively, the cranium and its central nervous system surfaces of the vertebra body support attachment to the intervertebral discs. The posterior part of a vertebra forms a vertebral arch (in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Osteoderm
Osteoderms are bony deposits forming scales, plates, or other structures based in the dermis. Osteoderms are found in many groups of extant and extinct reptiles and amphibians, including lizards, crocodilians, frogs, temnospondyls (extinct amphibians), various groups of dinosaurs (most notably ankylosaurs and stegosaurians), phytosaurs, aetosaurs, placodonts, and hupehsuchians (marine reptiles with possible ichthyosaur affinities). Osteoderms are uncommon in mammals, although they have occurred in many xenarthrans (armadillos and the extinct glyptodonts and mylodontid and scelidotheriid ground sloths). The heavy, bony osteoderms have evolved independently in many different lineages. The armadillo osteoderm is believed to develop in subcutaneous dermal tissues. These varied structures should be thought of as anatomical analogues, not homologues, and do not necessarily indicate monophyly. The structures are however derived from scutes, common to all classes of amniotes and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Triassic
The Triassic ( ) is a geologic period and system which spans 50.6 million years from the end of the Permian Period 251.902 million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning of the Jurassic Period 201.36 Mya. The Triassic is the first and shortest period of the Mesozoic Era. Both the start and end of the period are marked by major extinction events. The Triassic Period is subdivided into three epochs: Early Triassic, Middle Triassic and Late Triassic. The Triassic began in the wake of the Permian–Triassic extinction event, which left the Earth's biosphere impoverished; it was well into the middle of the Triassic before life recovered its former diversity. Three categories of organisms can be distinguished in the Triassic record: survivors from the extinction event, new groups that flourished briefly, and other new groups that went on to dominate the Mesozoic Era. Reptiles, especially archosaurs, were the chief terrestrial vertebrates during this time. A specialized subgroup of archo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Synapomorphy
In phylogenetics, an apomorphy (or derived trait) is a novel character or character state that has evolved from its ancestral form (or plesiomorphy). A synapomorphy is an apomorphy shared by two or more taxa and is therefore hypothesized to have evolved in their most recent common ancestor. ) In cladistics, synapomorphy implies homology. Examples of apomorphy are the presence of erect gait, fur, the evolution of three middle ear bones, and mammary glands in mammals but not in other vertebrate animals such as amphibians or reptiles, which have retained their ancestral traits of a sprawling gait and lack of fur. Thus, these derived traits are also synapomorphies of mammals in general as they are not shared by other vertebrate animals. Etymology The word —coined by German entomologist Willi Hennig—is derived from the Ancient Greek words (''sún''), meaning "with, together"; (''apó''), meaning "away from"; and (''morphḗ''), meaning "shape, form". Clade analysis T ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the Roman Republic it became the dominant language in the Italian region and subsequently throughout the Roman Empire. Even after the fall of Western Rome, Latin remained the common language of international communication, science, scholarship and academia in Europe until well into the 18th century, when other regional vernaculars (including its own descendants, the Romance languages) supplanted it in common academic and political usage, and it eventually became a dead language in the modern linguistic definition. Latin is a highly inflected language, with three distinct genders (masculine, feminine, and neuter), six or seven noun cases (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, ablative, and vocative), five declensions, four verb conjuga ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territories, nine Minor Outlying Islands, and 326 Indian reservations. The United States is also in free association with three Pacific Island sovereign states: the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, and the Republic of Palau. It is the world's third-largest country by both land and total area. It shares land borders with Canada to its north and with Mexico to its south and has maritime borders with the Bahamas, Cuba, Russia, and other nations. With a population of over 333 million, it is the most populous country in the Americas and the third most populous in the world. The national capital of the United States is Washington, D.C. and its most populous city and principal financial center is New York City. Paleo-Americ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
