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Tingamarra Local Fauna
''Tingamarra'' is an extinct genus of mammals from Australia. Its age, lifestyle, and relationships remain controversial. Discovery ''Tingamarra'' was discovered in 1987, when a single tooth was found at the Murgon fossil site in south-eastern Queensland. An ankle bone and an ear bone found at Murgon may also belong to this animal. Material Holotype: QMF20564, isolated right lower molar, probably an M2 or M3. Diagnosis # Non-twinned hypoconulid and entoconid. # Lack of a well developed buccal postcingulid. # Lack of anteroposteriorly compressed trigonid. # Broadly open trigonid. # Lingually situated paraconid that is also well anterior to the protoconid. Assumed lifestyle ''Tingamarra'' is believed to be a small (about 20 cm from head to tail) ground-dwelling mammal that ate insects and fruit. Scientific significance The age of Murgon fossils was determined as the early Eocene. By the shape of the found tooth, ''Tingamarra'' was first classified as a condylarth. This ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eocene
The Eocene ( ) is a geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (Ma). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period (geology), Period in the modern Cenozoic Era (geology), Era. The name ''Eocene'' comes from the Ancient Greek (''Ēṓs'', 'Eos, Dawn') and (''kainós'', "new") and refers to the "dawn" of modern ('new') fauna that appeared during the epoch.See: *Letter from William Whewell to Charles Lyell dated 31 January 1831 in: * From p. 55: "The period next antecedent we shall call Eocene, from ήως, aurora, and χαινος, recens, because the extremely small proportion of living species contained in these strata, indicates what may be considered the first commencement, or ''dawn'', of the existing state of the animate creation." The Eocene spans the time from the end of the Paleocene Epoch to the beginning of the Oligocene Epoch. The start of the Eocene is marked by a brief period in which the concentration of the carbon isoto ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Genus
Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In binomial nomenclature, the genus name forms the first part of the binomial species name for each species within the genus. :E.g. ''Panthera leo'' (lion) and ''Panthera onca'' (jaguar) are two species within the genus ''Panthera''. ''Panthera'' is a genus within the family Felidae. The composition of a genus is determined by taxonomy (biology), taxonomists. The standards for genus classification are not strictly codified, so different authorities often produce different classifications for genera. There are some general practices used, however, including the idea that a newly defined genus should fulfill these three criteria to be descriptively useful: # monophyly – all descendants of an ancestral taxon are grouped together (i.e. Phylogeneti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Murgon Fossil Site
The Murgon fossil site is a paleontological site of early Eocene age in south-eastern Queensland, Australia. It lies near the town of Murgon, some 270 km north-west of Brisbane. The Murgon site is important as the only site on the continent with a diverse range of vertebrate fossils dating from the early Paleogene Period (55 million years ago, only 11 million years after the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs), making it a crucial period in mammal evolution. It is also important in demonstrating Australia's Gondwanan links with South America in the form of similar fossils from the two continents. Geology Volcanic rock which has been estimated to be 40 million years old overlays the site. Therefore, the Murgon fossils must be older than this. The site is mostly clay which was laid down in a lake which formed in a volcanic crater. Fossil fauna The fossil fauna reported from Murgon is referred to as the Tingamarra fauna. The most common fossil at the site are ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Queensland
Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south, respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and the Pacific Ocean; to the state's north is the Torres Strait, separating the Australian mainland from Papua New Guinea, and the Gulf of Carpentaria to the north-west. With an area of , Queensland is the world's List of country subdivisions by area, sixth-largest subnational entity; it List of countries and dependencies by area, is larger than all but 16 countries. Due to its size, Queensland's geographical features and climates are diverse, and include tropical rainforests, rivers, coral reefs, mountain ranges and white sandy beaches in its Tropical climate, tropical and Humid subtropical climate, sub-tropical c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Condylarth
Condylarthra is an informal group – previously considered an Order (biology), order – of extinct placental mammals, known primarily from the Paleocene and Eocene epochs. They are considered early, primitive ungulates and is now largely considered to be a wastebasket taxon, having served as a dumping ground for classifying ungulates which had not been clearly established as part of either Perissodactyla or Artiodactyla, being composed thus of several unrelated lineages. Taxonomic history Condylarthra always was a problematic group. When first described by , Phenacodontidae was the type and only family therein. , however, raised Condylarthra to an order and included a wide range of diverse placentals with generalized dentitions and postcranial skeletons. More recent researchers (i.e. post-WW2) have been more restrictive; either including only a limited number of taxa, or proposing that the term should be abandoned altogether. Due to their primitive characteristics condylarths ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ungulate
Ungulates ( ) are members of the diverse clade Euungulata ("true ungulates"), which primarily consists of large mammals with Hoof, hooves. Once part of the clade "Ungulata" along with the clade Paenungulata, "Ungulata" has since been determined to be a polyphyletic and thereby invalid clade based on molecular data. As a result, true ungulates had since been reclassified to the newer clade Euungulata in 2001 within the clade Laurasiatheria while Paenungulata has been reclassified to a distant clade Afrotheria. Living ungulates are divided into two orders: Perissodactyla including Equidae, equines, rhinoceroses, and tapirs; and Artiodactyla including Bos, cattle, antelope, Sus (genus), pigs, giraffes, camels, Ovis, sheep, deer, and Hippopotamidae, hippopotamuses, among others. Cetaceans such as Whale, whales, Dolphin, dolphins, and Porpoise, porpoises are also classified as artiodactyls, although they do not have hooves. Most terrestrial ungulates use the hoofed tips of their toes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eutheria
Eutheria (from Greek , 'good, right' and , 'beast'; ), also called Pan-Placentalia, is the clade consisting of Placentalia, placental mammals and all therian mammals that are more closely related to placentals than to marsupials. Eutherians are distinguished from non-eutherians by various phenotypic traits of the feet, ankles, jaws and teeth. All extant eutherians lack epipubic bones, which are present in all other living mammals (marsupials and monotremes). This allows for expansion of the abdomen during pregnancy, though epipubic bones are present in many primitive eutherians. Eutheria was named in 1872 by Theodore Gill; in 1880, Thomas Henry Huxley defined it to encompass a more broadly defined group than Placentalia. The earliest unambiguous eutherians are known from the Early Cretaceous Yixian Formation of China, dating around 120 million years ago. Two tribosphenic mammals, ''Durlstodon'' and ''Durlstotherium'' from the Berriasian age (~145–140 million years ago) of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rodent
Rodents (from Latin , 'to gnaw') are mammals of the Order (biology), order Rodentia ( ), which are characterized by a single pair of continuously growing incisors in each of the upper and Mandible, lower jaws. About 40% of all mammal species are rodents. They are native to all major land masses except for Antarctica, and several oceanic islands, though they have subsequently been introduced to most of these land masses by human activity. Rodents are extremely diverse in their ecology and lifestyles and can be found in almost every terrestrial habitat, including human-made environments. Species can be arboreal, fossorial (burrowing), saltatorial/ricochetal (leaping on their hind legs), or semiaquatic. However, all rodents share several morphological features, including having only a single upper and lower pair of ever-growing incisors. Well-known rodents include Mouse, mice, rats, squirrels, prairie dogs, porcupines, beavers, Cavia, guinea pigs, and hamsters. Once included wi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marsupials
Marsupials are a diverse group of mammals belonging to the infraclass Marsupialia. They are natively found in Australasia, Wallacea, and the Americas. One of marsupials' unique features is their reproductive strategy: the young are born in a relatively undeveloped state and then nurtured within a pouch on their mother's abdomen. Extant marsupials encompass many species, including kangaroos, koalas, opossums, possums, Tasmanian devils, wombats, wallabies, and bandicoots. Marsupials constitute a clade stemming from the last common ancestor of extant Metatheria, which encompasses all mammals more closely related to marsupials than to placentals. The evolutionary split between placentals and marsupials occurred 125-160 million years ago, in the Middle Jurassic-Early Cretaceous period. Presently, close to 70% of the 334 extant marsupial species are concentrated on the Australian continent, including mainland Australia, Tasmania, New Guinea, and nearby islands. The remaini ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oligocene
The Oligocene ( ) is a geologic epoch (geology), epoch of the Paleogene Geologic time scale, Period that extends from about 33.9 million to 23 million years before the present ( to ). As with other older geologic periods, the rock beds that define the epoch are well identified but the exact dates of the start and end of the epoch are slightly uncertain. The name Oligocene was coined in 1854 by the German paleontologist Heinrich Ernst Beyrich from his studies of marine beds in Belgium and Germany. The name comes from Ancient Greek (''olígos'') 'few' and (''kainós'') 'new', and refers to the sparsity of Neontology, extant forms of Mollusca, molluscs. The Oligocene is preceded by the Eocene Epoch and is followed by the Miocene Epoch. The Oligocene is the third and final epoch of the Paleogene Period. The Oligocene is often considered an important time of transition, a link between the archaic world of the tropical Eocene and the more modern ecosystems of the Miocene. Major chang ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Theria
Theria ( or ; ) is a scientific classification, subclass of mammals amongst the Theriiformes. Theria includes the eutherians (including the Placentalia, placental mammals) and the metatherians (including the marsupials) but excludes the egg-laying monotremes and various extinct mammals evolving prior to the common ancestor of placentals and marsupials. Characteristics Therians give birth to live young without a shelled egg (biology), egg. This is possible thanks to key proteins called Syncytin-1, syncytins which allow exchanges between the mother and its offspring through a placenta, even Marsupial#Reproductive system, rudimental ones such as in marsupials. Genetic studies have suggested a viral origin of syncytins through the Endogenous retrovirus, endogenization process. The marsupials and the placentals evolved from a common therian ancestor that gave live birth by suppressing the mother's immune system. While the marsupials continued to give birth to an underdeveloped fe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Condylarths
Condylarthra is an informal group – previously considered an order – of extinct placental mammals, known primarily from the Paleocene and Eocene epochs. They are considered early, primitive ungulates and is now largely considered to be a wastebasket taxon, having served as a dumping ground for classifying ungulates which had not been clearly established as part of either Perissodactyla or Artiodactyla, being composed thus of several unrelated lineages. Taxonomic history Condylarthra always was a problematic group. When first described by , Phenacodontidae was the type and only family therein. , however, raised Condylarthra to an order and included a wide range of diverse placentals with generalized dentitions and postcranial skeletons. More recent researchers (i.e. post-WW2) have been more restrictive; either including only a limited number of taxa, or proposing that the term should be abandoned altogether. Due to their primitive characteristics condylarths have been consi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
