Baurusuchinae is a

subfamily In biological classification, a subfamily (Latin: ', plural ') is an auxiliary (intermediate) taxonomic rank, next below family but more inclusive than genus. Standard nomenclature rules end subfamily botanical names with "-oideae", and zoologi ...

baurusuchid Baurusuchidae is a Gondwanan Family (biology), family of mesoeucrocodylians that lived during the Late Cretaceous. It is a group of terrestrial hypercarnivorous crocodilians from South America (Argentina and Brazil) and possibly Pakistan. Baurusu ...

crocodyliform Crocodyliformes is a clade of crurotarsan archosaurs, the group often traditionally referred to as "crocodilians". They are the first members of Crocodylomorpha to possess many of the features that define later relatives. They are the only pseudo ...

s from the

Late Cretaceous The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretaceous Period is divided in the geologic time scale. Rock strata from this epoch form the Upper Cretaceous Series. The Cretaceous is named after ''creta'', the ...

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

. Named in 2011, it contains the baurusuchids ''

Aphaurosuchus ''Aphaurosuchus'' is an extinct genus of baurusuchid mesoeucrocodylian known from the Late Cretaceous Bauru Basin of São Paulo, southern Brazil. It contains a single species, ''Aphaurosuchus escharafacies.'' Discovery and naming In 2012 the La ...

'', '' Aplestosuchus, Baurusuchus'' and ''

Stratiotosuchus ''Stratiotosuchus'' (from Greek, (stratiōtēs, "soldier") and (suchos, "crocodile")) is an extinct genus of baurusuchid mesoeucrocodylian from the Adamantina Formation in Brazil. It lived during the Late Cretaceous. The first fossils were ...

''. Baurusuchinae is one of two subfamilies of Baurusuchidae, the other being Pissarrachampsinae. Several features distinguish baurusuchines from pissarrachampsines and help diagnose the subfamily. The orbital section of the jugal is twice the depth of the infratemporal portion. There are depressions on the

quadrate Quadrate may refer to: * Quadrate bone * Quadrate (heraldry) * Quadrate lobe of liver * Quadrate tubercle The quadrate tubercle is a small tubercle found upon the upper part of the femur. It serves as a point of insertion of the quadratus femori ...

running from top to bottom. The condyle on the side of the quadrate is almost as wide as the middle condyle. The bottom of the choanal septum is smooth. The ridged border of the middle face of the angular does not overcome the front of the mandibular fenestra. The

frontal bone The frontal bone is a bone in the human skull. The bone consists of two portions.''Gray's Anatomy'' (1918) These are the vertically oriented squamous part, and the horizontally oriented orbital part, making up the bony part of the forehead, par ...

, situated behind the prefrontals, is very wide. The skull of baurusuchines is relatively straight when viewed from above. Baurusuchinae is a stem-based taxon formally defined in 2021 as the most inclusive clade containing ''

Baurusuchus pachecoi ''Baurusuchus'' is an extinct member of the ancestral crocodilian lineage, which lived in Brazil from 90 to 83.5 million years ago, in the Late Cretaceous period. Technically, it is a genus of baurusuchid mesoeucrocodylian. It was a terrest ...

'', but not ''

Pissarrachampsa sera ''Pissarrachampsa'' (meaning "piçarra he local name for the sandstones it was recovered fromcrocodile") is an extinct genus of baurusuchidae, baurusuchid mesoeucrocodylian from the Late Cretaceous of Brazil. It is based on a nearly complete ...

.'' Baurusuchines are only found in the

Bauru Basin The Bauru Group is a geological group of the Bauru Sub-basin, Paraná Basin in Minas Gerais, São Paulo, General Salgado, Itapecuru-Mirim, Mato Grosso, Brazil whose strata date back to the Late Cretaceous. Dinosaur remains are among the fossils ...

of Brazil, and are therefore endemic to the Bauru Group. Because of their restricted stratigraphic and geographic range, baurusuchines were probably

sympatric In biology, two related species or populations are considered sympatric when they exist in the same geographic area and thus frequently encounter one another. An initially interbreeding population that splits into two or more distinct species sh ...

, living in the same environment at the same time. Alternatively, they may have been stratigraphically separated, meaning that each species lived at a slightly different time.

References

Late Cretaceous crocodylomorphs Terrestrial crocodylomorphs Campanian first appearances Maastrichtian extinctions {{paleo-archosaur-stub