''Antofagastia'' is an

extinct Extinction is the termination of an organism by the death of its Endling, last member. A taxon may become Functional extinction, functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to Reproduction, reproduce and ...

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 bino ...

Notoungulate Notoungulata is an extinct order of ungulates that inhabited South America from the early Paleocene to the end of the Pleistocene, living from approximately 61 million to 11,000 years ago. Notoungulates were morphologically diverse, with forms re ...

, belonging to the family

Interatheriidae Interatheriidae is an extinct family of notoungulate mammals from South America. Interatheriids are known from the Middle Eocene (Mustersan) to the Early Pleistocene (Uquian).McKenna & Bell, 1997Linares, 2004 These animals were principally small- ...

. It lived during the Late

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 ...

in what is today

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

Description

This small animal was vaguely similar to a

marmot Marmots are large ground squirrels in the genus ''Marmota'', with 15 species living in Asia, Europe, and North America. These herbivores are active during the summer, when they can often be found in groups, but are not seen during the winter, w ...

or a

nutria The nutria () or coypu () (''Myocastor coypus'') is a herbivore, herbivorous, semiaquatic rodent from South America. Classified for a long time as the only member of the family Myocastoridae, ''Myocastor'' has since been included within Echimy ...

. It was characterized by its low-crowned (brachydont) premolars and molars, with a narrow lingual groove and small pits in the upper molars. The cheekbone, as in typical interatheriids, was characterized by the exclusion of the jugal bone from the orbit, due to the zygomatic process of the maxilla and the presence of a small descending process. It was much smaller than contemporary interatheres such as '' Notopithecus'' and '' Transpithecus''.

Classification

''Antofagastia'' was a basal representative of the

, a family of typothere

notoungulate Notoungulata is an extinct order of ungulates that inhabited South America from the early Paleocene to the end of the Pleistocene, living from approximately 61 million to 11,000 years ago. Notoungulates were morphologically diverse, with forms re ...

s that diversify during the Oligocene and Miocene. ''Antofagastia'' seems to occupy a position more derived than '' Notopithecus'' and '' Transpithecus'', but less derived than '' Santiagorothia'' and ''

Protypotherium ''Protypotherium'' is an extinct genus of Notoungulata, notoungulate mammals native to South America during the Oligocene and Miocene epoch (geology), epochs. A number of closely related animals date back further, to the Eocene. Fossils of ''Prot ...

''. ''Antofagastia'' was first described in 2014, based on fossil remains found in the

Geste Formation The Geste Formation () is a fossiliferous geologic formation of the Puna Plateau in the western Salta Province and northern Catamarca Province of the Argentine Northwest, northwestern Argentina. The formation, reaching a thickness of , is the ol ...

, from the Late Eocene of Northwestern

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

. It was related to '' Punapithecus''.*D. A. García-López & M. J. Babot (2014): Notoungulate faunas of north-western Argentina: new findings of early-diverging forms from the Eocene Geste Formation, Journal of Systematic Palaeontology, DOI: 10.1080/14772019.2014.930527

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q97369972 Typotheres Eocene mammals of South America Paleogene Argentina Fossils of Argentina Fossil taxa described in 2014 Prehistoric placental genera