Elosuchus
| Elosuchus Temporal range:
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| File:Elosuchus cherifiensis skull 1.JPG | |
| Skull of E. cherifiensis | |
| Scientific classification Edit this classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Clade: | Archosauria |
| Clade: | Pseudosuchia |
| Clade: | Crocodylomorpha |
| Family: | †Pholidosauridae |
| Genus: | †Elosuchus de Broin, 2002 |
| Species | |
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Elosuchus is an extinct genus of neosuchian crocodyliform that lived during the Middle Cretaceous of what is now Africa (Niger, Morocco, and Algeria).
Description and taxonomy
[edit | edit source]Elosuchus had an elongated snout like a gharial and was probably a fully aquatic animal. The type species, E. cherifiensis from Algeria and Morocco, was originally described as a species of Thoracosaurus by Lavocat,[2] but was recognized as a genus separate from Thoracosaurus by de Broin in 2002. Elosuchus felixi, described from the Echkar Formation of Niger, was renamed Fortignathus in 2016 and is either a dyrosaurid relative or a non-hyposaurine dyrosaurid.[3][4] The large skull measuring approximately 1.08 m (3.5 ft) long indicates a body length of up to 7.7 metres (25 ft).[1] In 2022, the largest known premaxilla specimen was referred to the genus, suggesting a maximum skull length of 1.35 m (4.4 ft).[5]
Phylogeny
[edit | edit source]
de Broin (2002) created the family Elosuchidae to contain Elosuchus and the genus Stolokrosuchus from Niger.[3] However, recent phylogenetic analyses usually find Stolokrosuchus to be one of the basalmost neosuchian, only distantly related to Elosuchus.[6][7][8][9] Some analyses find a monophyletic Pholidosauridae that includes Elosuchus,[8] while other analyses find Elosuchus to nest with taxa like Sarcosuchus in a clade as a sister-taxon to the node Dyrosauridae+Pholidosauridae.[7][9]
References
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- ^ Lavocat, R., 1955, Decouverte d'un Crocodilien du genre Thoracosaurus dans le Cretace Superiuer d'Afrique: Bulletin du Museum National d'Historie Naturelle, Paris, v. 2, n. 27, p. 338-340.
- ^ a b de Broin, F. de L., 2002, Elosuchus, a new genus of crocodile from the Lower Cretaceous of the North of Africa: C. R. Palevol, v. 1, p. 275-285.
- ^ Mark T. Young; Alexander K. Hastings; Ronan Allain; Thomas J. Smith (2016). "Revision of the enigmatic crocodyliform Elosuchus felixi de Lapparent de Broin, 2002 from the Lower–Upper Cretaceous boundary of Niger: potential evidence for an early origin of the clade Dyrosauridae". Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. Online edition. doi:10.1111/zoj.12452.
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