''Brazilichthys'' 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 ...

of prehistoric freshwater

ray-finned fish Actinopterygii (; ), members of which are known as ray-finned fish or actinopterygians, is a class of bony fish that comprise over 50% of living vertebrate species. They are so called because of their lightly built fins made of webbings of sk ...

that lived during the

Cisuralian The Cisuralian, also known as the Early Permian, is the first series/epoch of the Permian. The Cisuralian was preceded by the Pennsylvanian and followed by the Guadalupian. The Cisuralian Epoch is named after the western slopes of the Ural Mou ...

(early

Permian The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years, from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.902 Mya. It is the s ...

)

epoch In chronology and periodization, an epoch or reference epoch is an instant in time chosen as the origin of a particular calendar era. The "epoch" serves as a reference point from which time is measured. The moment of epoch is usually decided b ...

in what is now

Maranhão Maranhão () is a States of Brazil, state in Brazil. Located in the country's Northeast Region, Brazil, Northeast Region, it has a population of about 7 million and an area of and it is divided into 217 municipalities. Clockwise from north, it ...

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

(

Parnaíba Basin The Parnaíba Basin ( Portuguese: ''Bacia do Parnaíba'') is a large cratonic sedimentary basin located in the North and Northeast portion of Brazil. About 50% of its area is in the state of Maranhão, and the other 50% is in the states of Pará, ...

). The

type Type may refer to: Science and technology Computing * Typing, producing text via a keyboard, typewriter, etc. * Data type, collection of values used for computations. * File type * TYPE (DOS command), a command to display contents of a file. * ...

and only species, ''B. macrognathus'', is known from a single partially complete skull (ca. long), which was recovered from the

Pedra de Fogo Formation The Pedra de Fogo Formation is an Early Permian ( Kungurian) geological formation of the Parnaíba Basin, northeastern Brazil. It has outcrops mainly on the states of Maranhão and Piauí, as well as some in Tocantins. It is thought to have bee ...

near Pastos Bons,

Classification

''Brazilichthys'' is referred to its own

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

, Brazilichthyidae (

monotypy In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispe ...

). Its

evolutionary relationships Evolution is the change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, resulting in certai ...

to other

genera Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family as used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In binomial nomenclature, the genus name forms the first part of the binomial s ...

are not well known. It was hypothesized that ''Brazilichthys'' could be closely related to the

Triassic The Triassic ( ; sometimes symbolized 🝈) is a geologic period and system which spans 50.5 million years from the end of the Permian Period 251.902 million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning of the Jurassic Period 201.4 Mya. The Triassic is t ...

Birgeria ''Birgeria'' is a genus of carnivorous marine ray-finned fish from the Triassic period. ''Birgeria'' had a global distribution, with fossil known from Madagascar, Spitsbergen, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Slovenia, China, Russia, Canada and Nev ...

'', though this was subsequently considered unlikely.

References

Monotypic prehistoric ray-finned fish genera Permian Brazil Paleozoic fish of South America Fossils of Brazil Kungurian genera Fossil taxa described in 1991 {{palaeonisciformes-stub

Classification

See also

References