''Patagosmilus'' ("Patagonian knife" in

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

) is an extinct

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

of meat-eating

metatherian Metatheria is a mammalian clade that includes all mammals more closely related to marsupials than to placentals. First proposed by Thomas Henry Huxley in 1880, it is a more inclusive group than the marsupials; it contains all marsupials as well ...

mammal Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class Mammalia (), characterized by the presence of mammary glands which in females produce milk for feeding (nursing) their young, a neocortex (a region of the brain), fur or ...

of the family Thylacosmilidae, that lived in the

Middle Miocene The Middle Miocene is a sub-epoch of the Miocene Epoch made up of two stages: the Langhian and Serravallian stages. The Middle Miocene is preceded by the Early Miocene. The sub-epoch lasted from 15.97 ± 0.05 Ma to 11.608 ± 0.005 Ma (million y ...

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...

.''Patagosmilus''
at

Fossilworks Fossilworks is a portal which provides query, download, and analysis tools to facilitate access to the Paleobiology Database The Paleobiology Database is an online resource for information on the distribution and classification of fossil animals ...

.org Like other representatives of this family, such as '' Thylacosmilus atrox'' and '' Anachlysictis gracilis'', it was characterized by its elongated

fang A fang is a long, pointed tooth. In mammals, a fang is a modified maxillary tooth, used for biting and tearing flesh. In snakes, it is a specialized tooth that is associated with a venom gland (see snake venom). Spiders also have external fang ...

s of the upper jaw, similar to the well known "sabertooth cats" (

Machairodontinae Machairodontinae is an extinct subfamily of carnivoran mammals of the family Felidae (true cats). They were found in Asia, Africa, North America, South America, and Europe from the Miocene to the Pleistocene, living from about 16 million until ...

), of which they were ecological equivalents. Despite being geologically younger than ''Anachlysictis'', the morphology of ''Patagosmilus'' (including a bowed molar row and extremely long, "saber-like" upper canines) suggests that this species was more closely related to ''Thylacosmilus'' than ''Anachlysictis'', though in other respects this species is less specialized than ''Thylacosmilus''.

Description

The only known species of ''Patagosmilus'' is ''P. goini'', named in honor of the Argentine

paleontologist Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of fossi ...

Francisco Goín. This species was first described and named in 2010 by Analía Forasiepi and Alfredo Carlini based on the specimen MLP 07-VII-1-1, a crushed

skull The skull is a bone protective cavity for the brain. The skull is composed of four types of bone i.e., cranial bones, facial bones, ear ossicles and hyoid bone. However two parts are more prominent: the cranium and the mandible. In humans, the ...

and several postcranial fragments including part of an ungual

phalanx The phalanx ( grc, φάλαγξ; plural phalanxes or phalanges, , ) was a rectangular mass military formation, usually composed entirely of heavy infantry armed with spears, pikes, sarissas, or similar pole weapons. The term is particularly use ...

that was discovered in the

Collón Curá Formation The Collón Curá Formation ( es, Formación Collón Curá) is a Middle Miocene fossiliferous geological formation of the southern Neuquén Basin in northwestern Patagonia and the western Cañadón Asfalto Basin of central Patagonia, Argentina. Th ...

dated to the Middle Miocene (

Colloncuran The Colloncuran ( es, Colloncurense) age is a period of geologic time (15.5–13.8 Ma) within the Middle Miocene epoch of the Neogene, used more specifically within the SALMA classification in South America. It follows the Friasian and precedes ...

) in the west bank of the Chico River, in the

Río Negro Province Río Negro (, ''Black River'') is a province of Argentina, located in northern Patagonia. Neighboring provinces are from the south clockwise Chubut, Neuquén, Mendoza, La Pampa and Buenos Aires. To the east lies the Atlantic Ocean. Its capit ...

Patagonia Patagonia () refers to a geographical region that encompasses the southern end of South America, governed by Argentina and Chile. The region comprises the southern section of the Andes Mountains with lakes, fjords, temperate rainforests, and gl ...

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

. This is the first representative of Thylacosmilidae which have been found remains in the Patagonia, and the first genus recognised, along with ''Thylacosmilus'' and ''Anachlysictis'' that is an indisputable member of this group.Analía M. Forasiepi, Alfredo A. Carlini. A new thylacosmilid (Mammalia, Metatheria, Sparassodonta) from the Miocene of Patagonia. ''Zootaxa''. 2552, ss. 55–68, 2010 (Ing.)

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q9056778 Sparassodonts Miocene mammals of South America Colloncuran Laventan Neogene Argentina Fossils of Argentina Cañadón Asfalto Basin Fossil taxa described in 2010 Prehistoric mammal genera