Sphenosuchia
Sphenosuchia | ||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Junggarsuchus sloani |
||||||||||||
Temporal occurrence | ||||||||||||
Upper Triassic to Upper Jura | ||||||||||||
228 to 150 million years | ||||||||||||
Locations | ||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||
Systematics | ||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||
Scientific name | ||||||||||||
Sphenosuchia | ||||||||||||
von Huene , 1942 |
The Sphenosuchia are a taxon of the reptiles from the Upper Triassic and the Upper Jurassic , and are early members of the Crocodylomorpha , a taxon that unites the relatives of the crocodiles with the latter. The Sphenosuchia were small and medium-sized, lightly built terrestrial animals. The group may not be monophyletic .
features
They are mainly characterized by the lack of the derived characteristics of the crocodiles. The pneumatization of the posterior cranial region has not yet been developed so strongly. The skull was low and with its elongated snout had a distinctly crocodile-like shape. A secondary palate was not yet present or only in rudimentary form. The legs were very long compared to those of the crocodiles, the front and rear legs were almost the same length. They were toe-walkers , their carpal bones elongated. Your acetabulum (acetabulum) was similar to perforate the dinosaurs. The square leg was not in contact with the side of the skull. The scale leg was arched and forked at the back.
Genera
- Terrestrisuchus (Upper Triassic of England)
- Dibothrosuchus (Lower Jurassic of China)
- Kayentasuchus (Lower Jurassic of North America)
- Litargosuchus (Lower Jurassic of South Africa)
- Pedeticosaurus (Lower Jurassic of South Africa)
- Platyognathus (Lower Jurassic of China)
- Sphenosuchus (Lower Jurassic of South Africa)
- Macelognathus (Upper Jurassic of North America)
- Junggarsuchus (Middle Jurassic of China)
literature
- Michael J. Benton : Paleontology of the vertebrates. Translation of the 3rd English edition by Hans-Ulrich Pfretzschner. Pfeil, Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-89937-072-0 .
- Robert L. Carroll : Paleontology and Evolution of the Vertebrates. Thieme, Stuttgart et al. 1993, ISBN 3-13774-401-6 .
Web links
- Palæos Sphenosuchia
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c James M. Clark , Hans-Dieter Sues : Two new basal crocodylomorph archosaurs from the Lower Jurassic and the monophyly of the Sphenosuchia. In: Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. Vol. 136, No. 1, 2002, pp. 77-95, doi : 10.1046 / j.1096-3642.2002.00026.x .
- ↑ Ursula B. Göhlich , Luis M. Chiappe , James M. Clark, Hans-Dieter Sues: The systematic position of the Late Jurassic alleged dinosaur Macelognathus (Crocodylomorpha: Sphenosuchia). In: Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences. Vol. 42, No. 3, 2005, pp. 307–321, doi : 10.1139 / e05-005 , digital version (PDF; 1.51 MB) .
- ↑ James M. Clark, Xing Xu , Catherine A. Forster, Yuan Wang: A Middle Jurassic 'sphenosuchian' from China and the origin of the crocodylian skull. In: Nature . Vol. 430, No. 7003, 2004, pp. 1021-1024, doi : 10.1038 / nature02802 .