Nimbacinus
| Nimbacinus | ||||||||||||
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| Temporal occurrence | ||||||||||||
| Oligocene to Miocene | ||||||||||||
| 20 to 15 million years | ||||||||||||
| Locations | ||||||||||||
| Systematics | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Nimbacinus | ||||||||||||
| Muirhead & Archer , 1990 | ||||||||||||
Nimbacinus is a genus of the late Oligocene to the Middle Miocene.
features
Nimbacinus was the size of a fox and weighed around 5.3 kg, making it slightly heavier than Muribacinus , the smallest member of the Thylacinidae. An almost complete skeleton of Nimbacinus is known, which has anatomically very conservative features. The skull was 13 cm long, but has hardly any differences compared to that of today's pouch wolf . The lower jaw was more than 9 cm long and had teeth typical of the sacral mammals with three incisors with one canine , three premolars and four molars per jaw branch. The first incisor was the largest, the canine very large. The premolars and molars were of relatively simple construction with serrated tips, increasing in size towards the back. Overall, the bit is not very specialized and not as advanced as that of the recent pouch wolf.
Paleobiology
The carnivorous nimbacinus probably lived as a hunter on the forest floor, at the same time as various other species of thylacine. Compared to his small body size, Nimbacinus had quite a high biting force, which according to calculations reached 264 Newtons. Although this is less than a sixth of what a lion achieves today (1.77 kN ), based on the body and muscle mass and a bite force quotient calculated from this, it is 1.7 times stronger. This high biting force enabled Nimbacinus to kill significantly larger prey.
Systematics
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Internal system of the Thylacinidae family according to Wroe and Musser 2000
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Nimbacinus is a rather primitive representative of the Thylacinidae, its closest relative is Ngamalacinus , but this already has a slightly more modern dentition. The relationships within the Thylacinidae are still largely unclear. Sometimes Nimbacinus occurs at the same time as Mutpuracinus . Two species are known: Nimbacinus dicksoni Muirhead & Archer, 1990, lived in the late Oligocene to mid- Miocene and belongs to the Riversleigh local fauna of Riversleigh. Nimbacinus richi Murray & Merigian, 2000, lived in the Middle Miocene and is a member of the Bullock Creek local fauna of the Camfield Beds in the Northern Territory . The generic name Nimbacinus is derived from the word nimba of the Aboriginal language Waanyi and means "small", cinus comes from the Greek κινος ( kinos ), which is translated as "dog". Thus Nimbacinus is the "little dog".
literature
- Long, Archer, Flannery, Hand: Prehistoric Mammals of Australia and New Guinea, one hundred million years of evolution . Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore / London 2002, ISBN 0-8018-7223-5
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Stephen Wroe, Colin McHenr, Jeffrey Thomason: Bite club: comparative bite force in big biting mammals and the prediction of predatory behavior in fossil taxa. In: Proceeding of the Royal Society B, 2005, pp. 1-7, doi: 10.1098 / rspb.2004.2986
- ↑ Stephen Wroe: Muribacinus gadiyuli (Thylacinidae, Marsupalia), a very plesiomorphic Thycalonid from the Miocene of Riversleigh, Northwestern Queensland, and the problem of paraohyly for the Dasyuridae (Marsupalia). In: Journal of Paleontology , 70 (6), 1996, pp. 1032-1044
- ^ Peter Murray, Dirk Megirian: Two new genera and three new species of Thylacinidae (Marsupialia) from the Miocene of the Northern Territory, Australia. In: The Beagle , Records of the Museums and Art Galleries of the Northern Territory, 16, 2000, pp. 145-162
- ↑ a b c Stephen Wroe, A. Musser: The skull of Nimbacinus dicksoni (Thylacinidae: Marsupialia). In: Australian Journal of Zoology , 49 (5), 2000, pp. 487-514
- ^ Jeanette Muirhead: Two new early Miocene thylacines from Riversleigh, northwestern Queensland. In: Memoirs of The Queensland Museum , 41, 1997, pp. 367-377