10.5061/DRYAD.R4B158N
Bona, Paula
National Scientific and Technical Research Council
Ezcurra, Martín D.
National Scientific and Technical Research Council
Barrios, Francisco
National Scientific and Technical Research Council
Fernandez Blanco, María V.
National Scientific and Technical Research Council
Data from: A new Palaeocene crocodylian from southern Argentina sheds
light on the early history of caimanines
Dryad
dataset
2018
Alligatoridae
Cretaceous-Palaeogene
Protocaiman peligrensis
stem-Caimaninae
Protocaiman perigenesis
2018-08-06T15:42:18Z
2018-08-06T15:42:18Z
en
https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2018.0843
72567 bytes
1
CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication
Caimanines are crocodylians currently restricted to South and Central
America and the oldest members are from lower Palaeocene localities of the
Salamanca Formation (Chubut Province, Argentina). We report here a new
caimanine from this same unit represented by a skull roof and partial
braincase. Its phylogenetic relationships were explored in a cladistic
analysis using standard characters and a morphogeometric two-dimensional
configuration of the skull roof. The phylogenetic results were used for an
event-based supermodel quantitative palaeobiogeographic analysis. The new
species is recovered as the most basal member of the South American
caimanines, and the Cretaceous North American lineage “Brachychampsa and
related forms” as the most basal Caimaninae. The biogeographic results
estimated north-central North America as the ancestral area of Caimaninae,
showing that the Cretaceous and Palaeocene species of the group were more
widespread than thought and became regionally extinct in North America
around the Cretaceous–Palaeocene boundary. A dispersal event from
north-central North America during the middle Late Cretaceous explains the
arrival of the group to South America. The Palaeogene assemblage of
Patagonian crocodylians is composed of three lineages of caimanines as a
consequence of independent dispersal events that occurred between North
and South America and within South America around the
Cretaceous–Palaeogene boundary.
Bona et al Supplementary Information III character-taxon data matrixdata
matrix of Eusuchia used in the cladistic analysisBona et al Supplementary
Information III R2 (2).tnt
South America
American Continent