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Neuquensuchus
''Neuquensuchus'' (meaning "Neuquén crocodile", referring to the city) is an extinct genus of crocodyliform from the Santonian-age Upper Cretaceous Bajo de la Carpa Formation of Neuquén Province, Argentina. The known remains were discovered on the campus of Universidad Nacional del Comahue in the city of Neuquén. ''Neuquensuchus'' was named by Lucas E. Fiorelli and Jorge O. Calvo in a publication dated to 2007, but which became available in 2008. The type species is ''N. universitas'', in recognition of its discovery locality. Unlike the great majority of crocodyliforms, its shin was longer than its thigh, suggesting it had some running ability. Description ''Neuquensuchus'' is based on MUCPv-47, a partially articulated partial postcranial skeleton composed of six neck, four back, two hip, and five tail vertebrae; ribs; partial right shoulder blade and arm; left shoulder blade and upper arm; a partial pelvis; and most of the right leg above the foot. Another specimen, MUCP ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bajo De La Carpa Formation
The Bajo de la Carpa Formation is a geologic formation of the Neuquén Basin that crops out in northern Patagonia, in the provinces of Río Negro and Neuquén, Argentina. It is the oldest of two formations belonging to the Río Colorado Subgroup within the Neuquén Group. Formerly, that subgroup was treated as a formation, and the Bajo de la Carpa Formation was known as the Bajo de la Carpa Member.Sánchez ''et al.'', 2006 At its base, this formation conformably overlies the Plottier Formation of the older Río Neuquén Subgroup, and it is in turn overlain by the Anacleto Formation, the youngest and uppermost formation of the Neuquén Group. The Bajo de la Carpa Formation can reach in thickness in some locations, and consists mainly of sandstones of various colors, all of fluvial origin, with thin layers of mudstone and siltstone in between. Geological features such as geodes, chemical nodules, impressions of raindrops, and paleosols (fossil soils) are commonly found in this ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Notosuchia
Notosuchia is a suborder of primarily Gondwanan mesoeucrocodylian crocodylomorphs that lived during the Jurassic and Cretaceous. Some phylogenies recover Sebecosuchia as a clade within Notosuchia, others as a sister group (see below); if Sebecosuchia is included within Notosuchia its existence is pushed into the Middle Miocene, about 11 million years ago. Fossils have been found from South America, Africa, Asia, and Europe. Notosuchia was a clade of terrestrial crocodilians that evolved a range of feeding behaviours, including herbivory ('' Chimaerasuchus''), omnivory (''Simosuchus''), and terrestrial hypercarnivory (''Baurusuchus''). It included many members with highly derived traits unusual for crocodylomorphs, including mammal-like teeth, flexible bands of shield-like body armor similar to those of armadillos (''Armadillosuchus''), and possibly fleshy cheeks and pig-like snouts (''Notosuchus''). The suborder was first named in 1971 by Zulma Gasparini and has since undergone ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crocodyliformes
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] |
Late Cretaceous
The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretaceous Period is divided in the geologic time scale. Rock strata from this epoch form the Upper Cretaceous Series. The Cretaceous is named after ''creta'', the Latin word for the white limestone known as chalk. The chalk of northern France and the white cliffs of south-eastern England date from the Cretaceous Period. Climate During the Late Cretaceous, the climate was warmer than present, although throughout the period a cooling trend is evident. The tropics became restricted to equatorial regions and northern latitudes experienced markedly more seasonal climatic conditions. Geography Due to plate tectonics, the Americas were gradually moving westward, causing the Atlantic Ocean to expand. The Western Interior Seaway divided North America into eastern and western halves; Appalachia and Laramidia. India maintained a northward course towards Asia. In the Southern Hemisphere, Australia and Ant ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vertebra
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 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ziphosuchia
Ziphosuchia is a clade of mesoeucrocodylian crocodyliforms that includes notosuchians and sebecosuchians. Systematics First constructed in 2000, it was considered to include ''Notosuchus'', ''Libycosuchus'', and Sebecosuchia. In a 2004 phylogenetic study, it was defined as the most recent common ancestor of ''Notosuchus'', ''Libycosuchus'', and Baurusuchoidea and all of its descendants. Ziphosuchia is often considered to be the sister group of Neosuchia, a clade that includes modern crocodilians. ''Razanandrongobe ''Razanandrongobe'' (meaning "ancestor f thelarge lizard" in Malagasy) is a genus of carnivorous ziphosuchian crocodyliform from the Middle Jurassic of Madagascar. It contains the type and only species ''Razanandrongobe sakalavae'', named in 2 ...'' is the oldest representative of this clade.Dal Sasso C, Pasini G, Fleury G, Maganuco S. (2017) Razanandrongobe sakalavae, a gigantic mesoeucrocodylian from the Middle Jurassic of Madagascar, is the oldest known notosuc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fruitachampsa
''Fruitachampsa'' is a genus of shartegosuchid crocodyliform from the Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation of Colorado. It is known from multiple specimens that show it to have been a relatively long-limbed terrestrial quadrupedal predator less than long, with a short face and a prominent pair of canine-like teeth in the lower jaw. Before it was formally described in 2011, it was also known as the "Fruita form". Its type species is ''F. callisoni''. Discovery Fossils of ''Fruitachampsa'' have been found from the Fruita Paleontological Area (FPA) in Fruita, Colorado. The deposits in the FPA belong to the Morrison Formation, which is Late Jurassic in age. The first remains of ''Fruitachampsa'' were found by paleontologists James Clark and George Callison in 1975, who discovered a diverse assemblage of microvertebrates at the FPA. More complete material of ''Fruitachampsa'' was found in 1976, 1977, and 1979. ''Fruitachampsa'' has been found alongside another more basal crocodylomorp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zosuchus
''Zosuchus'' ("Zos anyoncrocodile") is a genus of basal, Late Cretaceous crocodyliform from the Mongolia. The type species is ''Z. davidsoni'', after preparator Amy Davidson. The name was emended to ''davidsonae'' in 2004. Discovery It was found in the Redbeds of Zos Canyon ( Djadokhta Formation) in the Gobi Desert of Mongolia by expeditions organized by the American Museum of Natural History, and described by palaeontologists Diego Pol and Mark Norell in 2004. Material of ''Z. davidsonae'' consists of five specimens: * IGM 100/1305 (holotype): isolated skull and lower jaws * IGM 100/1304 * IGM 100/1306 * IGM 100/1307 * IGM 100/1308 Morphology This genus had a very short snout. Systematics Pol & Norell (2004) found ''Zosuchus davidsoni'' to be sister to ''Sichuanosuchus'' and '' Shantungosuchus'', the three forming a basal clade of crocodyliforms based on the presence of a ventrally deflected posterior region of the mandibular rami. A 2018 cladistic analysis found ''Zos ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sichuanosuchus
''Sichuanosuchus'' is an extinct genus of crocodylomorph from the Late Jurassic and possibly Early Cretaceous of China. Systematics Poll and Norell (2004) recovered ''Sichuanosuchus'' as sister to ''Shantungosuchus'' and ''Zosuchus'' based on the presence of a ventrally deflected posterior region of the mandibular rami. Buscalioni (2017) recovered ''Sichuanosuchus'' as sister to ''Shantungosuchus'', ''Zosuchus'', and Shartegosuchidae, and Dollman et al. (2018) went further by erecting Shartegosuchoidea for the clade formed by Shartegosuchidae Shartegosuchidae is an extinct family of Late Jurassic and Early Cretaceous crocodylomorphs. The family is named after the Late Jurassic Shar Teeg Beds in southwestern Mongolia, from which most shartegosuchid remains have been found. Five genera ..., ''Sichuanosuchus'', ''Zosuchus'', and ''Shantungosuchus''.Kathleen N. Dollman; James M. Clark; Mark A. Norell; Xu Xing; Jonah N. Choiniere (2018). "Convergent evolution of a eusuchian-typ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cladistics
Cladistics (; ) is an approach to biological classification in which organisms are categorized in groups (" clades") based on hypotheses of most recent common ancestry. The evidence for hypothesized relationships is typically shared derived characteristics ( synapomorphies'')'' that are not present in more distant groups and ancestors. However, from an empirical perspective, common ancestors are inferences based on a cladistic hypothesis of relationships of taxa whose character states can be observed. Theoretically, a last common ancestor and all its descendants constitute a (minimal) clade. Importantly, all descendants stay in their overarching ancestral clade. For example, if the terms ''worms'' or ''fishes'' were used within a ''strict'' cladistic framework, these terms would include humans. Many of these terms are normally used paraphyletically, outside of cladistics, e.g. as a 'grade', which are fruitless to precisely delineate, especially when including extinct species. R ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shantungosuchus
''Shantungosuchus'' is an extinct genus of Early Cretaceous crocodyliform found in China. It includes three species: ''Shantungosuchus chuhsienensis'' and ''S. brachycephalus'', which were both described by Yang Zhongjian – usually referred to as "Young" – in 1961 and 1982, and ''S. hangjinensis'', which was described by Xiao-Chun Wu et al in 1994. ''S. chuhsienensis'' is the type for this genus. Etymology The primary part of ''Shantungosuchus name comes from ''Shan-tung'', the Wade-Giles romanization of ''Shandong'' (), a province located on the eastern coast of the People's Republic of China, where it was first discovered. The second part, ''suchus'' is an Ancient Greek word referring to the Egyptian crocodile deity Sobek that is commonly used as a suffix for crocodylomorph genera and crocodile-like animals in general. Description ''Shantungosuchus chuhsienenis'' was first described from an articulated skeleton that was preserved as an impression of its ventral s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Inch
Measuring tape with inches The inch (symbol: in or ″) is a unit of length in the British imperial and the United States customary systems of measurement. It is equal to yard or of a foot. Derived from the Roman uncia ("twelfth"), the word ''inch'' is also sometimes used to translate similar units in other measurement systems, usually understood as deriving from the width of the human thumb. Standards for the exact length of an inch have varied in the past, but since the adoption of the international yard during the 1950s and 1960s the inch has been based on the metric system and defined as exactly 25.4 mm. Name The English word "inch" ( ang, ynce) was an early borrowing from Latin ' ("one-twelfth; Roman inch; Roman ounce"). The vowel change from Latin to Old English (which became Modern English ) is known as umlaut. The consonant change from the Latin (spelled ''c'') to English is palatalisation. Both were features of Old English phonology; see and fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
