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Gavialis Breviceps
''Gavialis'' is a genus of crocodylians that includes the living gharial ''Gavialis gangeticus'' and one known extinct species, '' Gavialis bengawanicus.'' ''G. gangeticus'' comes from the Indian Subcontinent, while ''G. bengawanicus'' is known from Java. ''Gavialis'' likely first appeared in the Indian Subcontinent in the Pliocene and dispersed into the Malay Archipelago through a path called the Siva–Malayan route in the Quaternary. Remains attributed to ''Gavialis'' have also been found on Sulawesi and Woodlark Island east of the Wallace Line, suggesting a prehistoric lineage of ''Gavialis'' was able to traverse marine environments and reach places possibly as far as western Oceania. The genus ''Gavialis'' was reevaluated in 2018 based on specimens in the Natural History Museum, London that were collected in the Sivalik Hills. The author concluded that ''G. gangeticus'' and '' G. bengawanicus'' are the only two species in the genus ''Gavialis'', with '' G. hysudricus'' as a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Miocene
The Miocene ( ) is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and means "less recent" because it has 18% fewer modern marine invertebrates than the Pliocene has. The Miocene is preceded by the Oligocene and is followed by the Pliocene. As Earth went from the Oligocene through the Miocene and into the Pliocene, the climate slowly cooled towards a series of ice ages. The Miocene boundaries are not marked by a single distinct global event but consist rather of regionally defined boundaries between the warmer Oligocene and the cooler Pliocene Epoch. During the Early Miocene, the Arabian Peninsula collided with Eurasia, severing the connection between the Mediterranean and Indian Ocean, and allowing a faunal interchange to occur between Eurasia and Africa, including the dispersal of proboscideans into Eurasia. During the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Malay Archipelago
The Malay Archipelago (Indonesian/Malay: , tgl, Kapuluang Malay) is the archipelago between mainland Indochina and Australia. It has also been called the " Malay world," "Nusantara", "East Indies", Indo-Australian Archipelago, Spices Archipelago and other names over time. The name was taken from the 19th-century European concept of a Malay race, later based on the distribution of Austronesian languages. Situated between the Indian and Pacific Oceans, the archipelago of over 25,000 islands and islets is the largest archipelago by area and fourth by number of islands in the world. It includes Brunei, East Timor, Indonesia, Malaysia (East Malaysia), Papua New Guinea, the Philippines and Singapore.''Encyclopædia Britannica''. 2006. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. The term is largely synonymous with Maritime Southeast Asia. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gavialids
Gavialidae is a family of large semiaquatic crocodilians with elongated, narrow snouts. Gavialidae consists of two living species, the gharial (''Gavialis gangeticus'') and the false gharial (''Tomistoma schlegelii''), both occurring in Asia. Many extinct members are known from a broader range, including the recently extinct ''Hanyusuchus''. Gavialids are generally regarded as lacking the jaw strength to capture the large mammalian prey favoured by crocodiles and alligators of similar size so their thin snout is best used to catch fish, however the false gharial has been found to have a generalist diet with mature adults preying upon larger vertebrates, such as ungulates. Taxonomy The family Gavialidae was proposed by Arthur Adams in 1854 for reptiles with a very long and slender muzzle, webbed feet and nearly equal teeth. It is currently recognized as a crown group, meaning that it only includes the last common ancestor of all extant (living) gavialids (the gharial and false gha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
False Gharial
The false gharial (''Tomistoma schlegelii''), also known by the names Malayan gharial, Sunda gharial and tomistoma is a freshwater crocodilian of the family Gavialidae native to Peninsular Malaysia, Borneo, Sumatra and Java. It is listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, as the global population is estimated at around 2,500 to 10,000 mature individuals. The specific name ''schlegelii'' honors Hermann Schlegel. Taxonomy The scientific name ''Crocodilus (Gavialis) schlegelii'' was proposed by Salomon Müller in 1838 who described a specimen collected in Borneo. In 1846, he proposed to use the name ''Tomistoma schlegelii'', if it needs to be placed in a distinct genus. The genus ''Tomistoma'' potentially also contains several extinct species like ''T. cairense'', ''T. lusitanicum'', ''T. taiwanicus'', and ''T. coppensi''. However, these species may need to be reclassified to different genera as are paraphyletic. The false gharial's snout broadens considerably towards the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Extant Taxon
Neontology is a part of biology that, in contrast to paleontology, deals with living (or, more generally, '' recent'') organisms. It is the study of extant taxa (singular: extant taxon): taxa (such as species, genera and families) with members still alive, as opposed to (all) being extinct. For example: * The moose (''Alces alces'') is an extant species, and the dodo (''Raphus cucullatus'') is an extinct species. * In the group of molluscs known as the cephalopods, there were approximately 600 extant species and 7,500 extinct species. A taxon can be classified as extinct if it is broadly agreed or certified that no members of the group are still alive. Conversely, an extinct taxon can be reclassified as extant if there are new discoveries of living species ("Lazarus species"), or if previously-known extant species are reclassified as members of the taxon. Most biologists, zoologists, and botanists are in practice neontologists, and the term neontologist is used large ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cladogram
A cladogram (from Greek ''clados'' "branch" and ''gramma'' "character") is a diagram used in cladistics to show relations among organisms. A cladogram is not, however, an evolutionary tree because it does not show how ancestors are related to descendants, nor does it show how much they have changed, so many differing evolutionary trees can be consistent with the same cladogram. A cladogram uses lines that branch off in different directions ending at a clade, a group of organisms with a last common ancestor. There are many shapes of cladograms but they all have lines that branch off from other lines. The lines can be traced back to where they branch off. These branching off points represent a hypothetical ancestor (not an actual entity) which can be inferred to exhibit the traits shared among the terminal taxa above it. This hypothetical ancestor might then provide clues about the order of evolution of various features, adaptation, and other evolutionary narratives about ance ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dollosuchus
''Dollosuchus'' (meaning "Louis Dollo's crocodile") is an extinct monospecific genus of tomistomine crocodilian originally named as a species of ''Gavialis''. It is a basal form possibly related to ''Kentisuchus'', according to several phylogenetic analyses that have been conducted in recent years, and is the oldest known tomistomine to date. Fossils have been found from Belgium and the United Kingdom.Swinton, W. E. (1937)The Crocodile of Maransart (Dollosuchus dixoni [Owen]).''Mémoire'' 80: 3-46 It had large supratemporal fenestrae in relation to its orbits, similar to ''Kentisuchus'' and ''Thecachampsa''. ''Dollosuchus'' was originally described on the basis of numerous mandibular fragments found from the Early to Middle Eocene Bracklesham Beds Formation in the United Kingdom. The material cannot be distinguished from other related longirostrine, or long-snouted, crocodilians. A nearly complete skeleton from Belgium (IRScNB 482) discovered in 1915 and described by Swi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rhamphosuchus
''Rhamphosuchus'' ("Beak crocodile") is an extinct genus of gavialid crocodylians. It lived during the Pliocene and its fossils have been found in two regions; the Siwalik Hills of Pakistan and Northern India, India as well as the Sindh region of Pakistan. Its type species is ''Rhamphosuchus crassidens'', which is only known from incomplete sets of fossils, mostly teeth and skulls. Four species traditionally placed in the genus ''Gavialis'' may be included as well. Overview Traditionally, many palaeontologists estimated that it was one of the largest, if not the largest crocodylian that ever lived, reaching an estimated length of . However, a more recent study suggests that the animal may have been 8–11 m (26 to 36 ft) in length, and therefore is not the largest known crocodylian. Another crocodylian, ''Purussaurus'', from the Miocene of Peru and Brazil, is known from an equally incomplete fossil set. It is estimated to have been similar in length to the initial estimates at a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sivalik Hills
The Sivalik Hills, also known as the Shivalik Hills and Churia Hills, are a mountain range of the outer Himalayas that stretches over about from the Indus River eastwards close to the Brahmaputra River, spanning the northern parts of the Indian subcontinent. It is wide with an average elevation of . Between the Teesta and Raidāk Rivers in Assam is a gap of about . "Sivalik" literally means 'tresses of Shiva'. Sivalik region is home to the Soanian archaeological culture. Geology Geologically, the Sivalik Hills belong to the Tertiary deposits of the outer Himalayas. They are chiefly composed of sandstone and conglomerate rock formations, which are the solidified detritus of the Himalayas to their north; they are poorly consolidated. The remnant magnetisation of siltstones and sandstones indicates that they were deposited 16–5.2 million years ago. In Nepal, the Karnali River exposes the oldest part of the Shivalik Hills. They are bounded on the south by a fault syst ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Natural History Museum, London
The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. The Natural History Museum's main frontage, however, is on Cromwell Road. The museum is home to life and earth science specimens comprising some 80 million items within five main collections: botany, entomology, mineralogy, palaeontology and zoology. The museum is a centre of research specialising in taxonomy, identification and conservation. Given the age of the institution, many of the collections have great historical as well as scientific value, such as specimens collected by Charles Darwin. The museum is particularly famous for its exhibition of dinosaur skeletons and ornate architecture—sometimes dubbed a ''cathedral of nature''—both exemplified by the large ''Diplodocus'' cast that domina ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oceania
Oceania (, , ) is a region, geographical region that includes Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Spanning the Eastern Hemisphere, Eastern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres, Oceania is estimated to have a land area of and a population of around 44.5 million as of 2021. When compared with (and sometimes described as being one of) the continents, the region of Oceania is the smallest in land area and the list of continents and continental subregions by population, second least populated after Antarctica. Its major population centres are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Auckland, Adelaide, Honolulu, and Christchurch. Oceania has a diverse mix of economies from the developed country, highly developed and globally competitive market economy, financial markets of Australia, French Polynesia, Hawaii, Hawaii, New Caledonia, and New Zealand, which rank high in quality of life and Human Development Index, to the much least developed countries, less developed ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wallace Line
The Wallace Line or Wallace's Line is a faunal boundary line drawn in 1859 by the British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace and named by English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley that separates the biogeographical realms of Asia and Wallacea, a transitional zone between Asia and Australia. West of the line are found organisms related to Asiatic species; to the east, a mixture of species of Asian and Australian origin is present. Wallace noticed this clear division during his travels through the East Indies in the 19th century. The line runs through Indonesia, between Borneo and Sulawesi (Celebes), and through the Lombok Strait between Bali and Lombok. The distance between Bali and Lombok is small, about . The distributions of many bird species observe the line, since many birds do not cross even the shortest stretches of open ocean water. Some bats have distributions that cross the line, but larger terrestrial mammals are generally limited to one side or the other; exceptions include ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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