''Araeodelphis'' 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 ...

river dolphin River dolphins are a polyphyletic group of fully aquatic mammals that reside exclusively in freshwater or brackish water. They are an informal grouping of dolphins, which itself is a paraphyletic group within the infraorder Cetacea. Extant rive ...

from the early

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first epoch (geology), geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and mea ...

of the

East Coast of the United States The East Coast of the United States, also known as the Eastern Seaboard, the Atlantic Coast, and the Atlantic Seaboard, is the region encompassing the coast, coastline where the Eastern United States meets the Atlantic Ocean; it has always pla ...

.Stephen J. Godfrey; Lawrence G. Barnes; Olivier Lambert (2017). "The Early Miocene odontocete Araeodelphis Natator Kellogg, 1957 (Cetacea; Platanistidae), from the Calvert Formation of Maryland, U.S.A.". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. in press: e1278607. doi:10.1080/02724634.2017.1278607.R. Kellogg. 1957. Two additional Miocene porpoises from the Calvert Cliffs Maryland. Proceedings of the United States National Museum 107(3387):279-337

Fossils

Remains of ''Araeodelphis'' are known from the early Miocene

Burdigalian The Burdigalian is, in the geologic timescale, an age (geology), age or stage (stratigraphy), stage in the early Miocene. It spans the time between 20.43 ± 0.05 annum, Ma and 15.97 ± 0.05 Ma (million years ago). Preceded by the Aquitanian (sta ...

-age Plum Point Member of the Calvert Formation in Maryland.

Phylogeny

Cladistic analysis by Godfrey et al. (2017) recovers ''Araeodelphis'' as basal to the

South Asian river dolphin South Asian river dolphins are toothed whales in the genus ''Platanista'', which inhabit the waterways of the Indian subcontinent. They were historically considered to be one species (''P. gangetica'') with the Ganges river dolphin and the Indu ...

the platanistid subfamily Pomatodelphinae.

References

Platanistidae Prehistoric toothed whales Miocene cetaceans Fossil taxa described in 1957 {{Paleo-whale-stub