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Kaprosuchus
''Kaprosuchus'' is an extinct genus of mahajangasuchid crocodyliform. It is known from a single nearly complete skull collected from the Upper Cretaceous Echkar Formation of Niger. The name means "boar crocodile" from the Greek , ''kapros'' ("boar") and , ''soukhos'' ("crocodile") in reference to its unusually large caniniform teeth which resemble those of a boar. It has been nicknamed "BoarCroc" by Paul Sereno and Hans Larsson, who first described the genus in a monograph published in ''ZooKeys'' in 2009 along with other Saharan crocodyliformes such as ''Anatosuchus'' and ''Laganosuchus''. The type species is ''K. saharicus''. Description ''Kaprosuchus'' is known from a nearly complete skull 507 mm in length in which the lower jaw measured 603 mm long. The original description estimated the entire animal to be in length,National Geographic. November 2009. p. 140-141 although newer estimates lowered this to around 4 meters (13.1 ft). It possesses three sets of tusk- ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mahajangasuchidae
Mahajangasuchidae is an extinct family of notosuchian crocodyliforms. It currently contains two genera, '' Mahajangasuchus'' and '' Kaprosuchus'', both of which lived during the Late Cretaceous in Gondwana. It is defined as the most inclusive clade containing ''Mahajangasuchus insignis'' but not ''Notosuchus terrestris'', '' Simosuchus clarki'', '' Araripesuchus gomesii'', ''Baurusuchus pachecoi'', '' Peirosaurus torminni'', '' Goniopholis crassidens'', '' Pholidosaurus schaumbergensis'', or ''Crocodylus niloticus''. Phylogenetically, Mahajangasuchidae is placed just outside pholidosaurids and more derived neosuchians. Defining characters of the family include fused nasals, a jaw articulation below the posterior maxillary tooth row, a deep mandibular symphysis that is oriented anterodorsally, and the formation of a hornlike posterodorsal process from the squamosal and parietal (which is much more pronounced in ''Kaprosuchus''). Phylogeny Cladogram showing the phylogenetic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mahajangasuchus
''Mahajangasuchus'' is an extinct genus of crocodyliform which had blunt, conical teeth. The type species, ''M. insignis'', lived during the Late Cretaceous; its fossils have been found in the Maevarano Formation in northern Madagascar. It was a fairly large predator, measuring up to long. Discovery and naming With the inception of the Mahajanga Basin Project (MBP) in 1993, led by Dr. David Krause, came a significant increase of discoveries and research into the fauna of the Maastrichtian Maevarano Formation in northern Madagascar. This included a variety of crocodylomorphs with the largest specimen being a well preserved disarticulated skeleton discovered in 1995 roughly 1 km south-east of the village of Berivotra. This skeleton, specimen ''UA 8654'', consisted of a complete left and partial right mandible, vertebrae of the cervical, dorsal, saccral and caudal regions, several ribs as well as material of the pectoral, pelvic girdle and limb bones. Osteoderms and isolated t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Echkar Formation
The Echkar Formation is a geological formation comprising sandstones and claystones in the Agadez Region of Niger, central Africa. Description Its strata date back to the Late Albian to Late Cretaceous (Cenomanian stages, about 100-95 million years ago). Dinosaur remains are among the fossils that have been recovered from the formation.Weishampel, David B; et al. (2004). "Dinosaur distribution (Early Cretaceous, Africa)." In: Weishampel, David B.; Dodson, Peter; and Osmólska, Halszka (eds.): The Dinosauria, 2nd, Berkeley: University of California Press. Pp. 571-573. . Fossil content In Abangarit-Tamesna at .org Vertebrates See ...
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Paul Sereno
Paul Callistus Sereno (born October 11, 1957) is a professor of paleontology at the University of Chicago and a National Geographic "explorer-in-residence" who has discovered several new dinosaur species on several continents, including at sites in Inner Mongolia, Argentina, Morocco and Niger. One of his most widely publicized discoveries is that of a nearly complete specimen of ''Sarcosuchus imperator'' — popularly known as SuperCroc — at Gadoufaoua in the Tenere desert of Niger. Biography Youth and education The son of a mail carrier and an art teacher at Prairie Elementary, Sereno grew up in Naperville, Illinois and graduated from Naperville Central High School. He was then educated at Northern Illinois University (B.S., Biological Sciences, 1979) and Columbia University (M.A., Vertebrate Paleontology, 1981; M. Phil., Geological Sciences, 1981; Ph.D., Geological Sciences, 1987). Career Sereno was named one of ''People'' magazine's 50 Most Beautiful People (1997). Ser ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crocodyliform
Crocodyliformes is a clade of crurotarsan archosaurs, the group often traditionally referred to as "crocodilians". They are the first members of Crocodylomorpha to possess many of the features that define later relatives. They are the only pseudosuchians to survive the K-Pg extinction event. In 1988, Michael J. Benton and James M. Clark argued that all traditional names for well-known groups of animals should be restricted to their crown clades, that is, used only for natural groups comprising all living members of any given lineage. This posed a problem for the crocodilians, because the name Crocodylia, while used in various ways by various scientists, had always included not only living crocodilians but many of their extinct ancestors known only from the fossil record.Benton, M.J. and Clark, J.M. (1988). "Archosaur phylogeny and the relationships of the Crocodylia." Pp. 295–338 in Benton, M.J. (ed.), ''The phylogeny and classification of the Tetrapods, volume 1''. Oxford: Cl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Laganosuchus
''Laganosuchus'' is an extinct genus of stomatosuchid crocodyliform. Fossils have been found from Niger and Morocco and date back to the Upper Cretaceous. Discovery The name means "pancake crocodile" from the Greek , ("pancake") and , ("crocodile") in reference to the shallow depth of the skull, which is characteristic of all stomatosuchids. It has been nicknamed "PancakeCroc" by Paul Sereno and Hans Larsson, who first described the genus in a monograph published in ''ZooKeys'' in 2009 along with other Saharan crocodyliformes such as ''Anatosuchus'' and '' Kaprosuchus''. The type species is ''L. thaumastos'' (meaning 'the astonishing pancake crocodile' from Greek θαυμαζω, ''thaumazo'' "I astonish" in reference to its unusual form) from the Cenomanian-age Echkar Formation in Niger, holotype MNN IGU13. A second species, ''L. maghrebensis'' (making a reference to the place of discovery), is known from the Kem Kem Beds in Morocco, which are also Cenomanian in age; its h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Madagascar
Madagascar (; mg, Madagasikara, ), officially the Republic of Madagascar ( mg, Repoblikan'i Madagasikara, links=no, ; french: République de Madagascar), is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately off the coast of East Africa across the Mozambique Channel. At Madagascar is the world's List of island countries, second-largest island country, after Indonesia. The nation is home to around 30 million inhabitants and consists of the island of Geography of Madagascar, Madagascar (the List of islands by area, fourth-largest island in the world), along with numerous smaller peripheral islands. Following the prehistoric breakup of the supercontinent Gondwana, Madagascar split from the Indian subcontinent around 90 million years ago, allowing native plants and animals to evolve in relative isolation. Consequently, Madagascar is a biodiversity hotspot; over 90% of wildlife of Madagascar, its wildlife is endemic. Human settlement of Madagascar occurred during or befo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Family (biology)
Family ( la, familia, plural ') is one of the eight major hierarchical taxonomic ranks in Linnaean taxonomy. It is classified between order and genus. A family may be divided into subfamilies, which are intermediate ranks between the ranks of family and genus. The official family names are Latin in origin; however, popular names are often used: for example, walnut trees and hickory trees belong to the family Juglandaceae, but that family is commonly referred to as the "walnut family". What belongs to a family—or if a described family should be recognized at all—are proposed and determined by practicing taxonomists. There are no hard rules for describing or recognizing a family, but in plants, they can be characterized on the basis of both vegetative and reproductive features of plant species. Taxonomists often take different positions about descriptions, and there may be no broad consensus across the scientific community for some time. The publishing of new data and opini ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Internasal Suture
The nasal bones are two small oblong bones, varying in size and form in different individuals; they are placed side by side at the middle and upper part of the face and by their junction, form the bridge of the upper one third of the nose. Each has two surfaces and four borders. Structure The two nasal bones are joined at the midline internasal suture and make up the bridge of the nose. Surfaces The ''outer surface'' is concavo-convex from above downward, convex from side to side; it is covered by the procerus and nasalis muscles, and perforated about its center by a foramen, for the transmission of a small vein. The ''inner surface'' is concave from side to side, and is traversed from above downward, by a groove for the passage of a branch of the nasociliary nerve. Articulations The nasal articulates with four bones: two of the cranium, the frontal and ethmoid, and two of the face, the opposite nasal and the maxilla. Other animals In primitive bony fish and tetrapod ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Keratinous
Keratin () is one of a family of structural fibrous proteins also known as ''scleroproteins''. Alpha-keratin (α-keratin) is a type of keratin found in vertebrates. It is the key structural material making up scales, hair, nails, feathers, horns, claws, hooves, and the outer layer of skin among vertebrates. Keratin also protects epithelial cells from damage or stress. Keratin is extremely insoluble in water and organic solvents. Keratin monomers assemble into bundles to form intermediate filaments, which are tough and form strong unmineralized epidermal appendages found in reptiles, birds, amphibians, and mammals. Excessive keratinization participate in fortification of certain tissues such as in horns of cattle and rhinos, and armadillos' osteoderm. The only other biological matter known to approximate the toughness of keratinized tissue is chitin. Keratin comes in two types, the primitive, softer forms found in all vertebrates and harder, derived forms found only among saurop ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parietal Bone
The parietal bones () are two bones in the Human skull, skull which, when joined at a fibrous joint, form the sides and roof of the Human skull, cranium. In humans, each bone is roughly quadrilateral in form, and has two surfaces, four borders, and four angles. It is named from the Latin ''paries'' (''-ietis''), wall. Surfaces External The external surface [Fig. 1] is convex, smooth, and marked near the center by an eminence, the parietal eminence (''tuber parietale''), which indicates the point where ossification commenced. Crossing the middle of the bone in an arched direction are two curved lines, the superior and inferior temporal lines; the former gives attachment to the temporal fascia, and the latter indicates the upper limit of the muscular origin of the temporal muscle. Above these lines the bone is covered by a tough layer of fibrous tissue – the epicranial aponeurosis; below them it forms part of the temporal fossa, and affords attachment to the temporal muscle. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Premaxilla
The premaxilla (or praemaxilla) is one of a pair of small cranial bones at the very tip of the upper jaw of many animals, usually, but not always, bearing teeth. In humans, they are fused with the maxilla. The "premaxilla" of therian mammal has been usually termed as the incisive bone. Other terms used for this structure include premaxillary bone or ''os premaxillare'', intermaxillary bone or ''os intermaxillare'', and Goethe's bone. Human anatomy In human anatomy, the premaxilla is referred to as the incisive bone (') and is the part of the maxilla which bears the incisor teeth, and encompasses the anterior nasal spine and alar region. In the nasal cavity, the premaxillary element projects higher than the maxillary element behind. The palatal portion of the premaxilla is a bony plate with a generally transverse orientation. The incisive foramen is bound anteriorly and laterally by the premaxilla and posteriorly by the palatine process of the maxilla. It is formed from the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
