Eutheriodontia is a

clade In biology, a clade (), also known as a Monophyly, monophyletic group or natural group, is a group of organisms that is composed of a common ancestor and all of its descendants. Clades are the fundamental unit of cladistics, a modern approach t ...

of therapsids which appear during the Middle Permian and which includes

therocephalia Therocephalia is an extinct clade of therapsids (mammals and their close extinct relatives) from the Permian and Triassic periods. The therocephalians ("beast-heads") are named after their large skulls, which, along with the structure of their te ...

ns and

cynodont Cynodontia () is a clade of eutheriodont therapsids that first appeared in the Late Permian (approximately 260 Megaannum, mya), and extensively diversified after the Permian–Triassic extinction event. Mammals are cynodonts, as are their extin ...

s, this latter group including

mammal A mammal () is a vertebrate animal of the Class (biology), class Mammalia (). Mammals are characterised by the presence of milk-producing mammary glands for feeding their young, a broad neocortex region of the brain, fur or hair, and three ...

s and related forms. With the

dicynodont Dicynodontia is an extinct clade of anomodonts, an extinct type of non-mammalian therapsid. Dicynodonts were herbivores that typically bore a pair of tusks, hence their name, which means 'two dog tooth'. Members of the group possessed a horny, t ...

s, they form one of two lineages of therapsids that survived the End-Permian extinction and which diversified again during 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 ...

, before the majority of them disappeared before or during the Triassic–Jurassic extinction, except for a lineage of cynodonts that later gave rise to mammals.

Classification

The clade was named in 1986 by James Allen Hopson and Herbert Richard Barghusen, the name meaning the "true Theriodontia". Within Hopson's system, the Eutheriodontia are the

sister group In phylogenetics, a sister group or sister taxon, also called an adelphotaxon, comprises the closest relative(s) of another given unit in an evolutionary tree. Definition The expression is most easily illustrated by a cladogram: Taxon A and ...

of the

Gorgonopsia Gorgonopsia (from the Greek Gorgon, a mythological beast, and 'aspect') is an extinct clade of Saber-toothed predator, sabre-toothed therapsids from the Middle Permian, Middle to the Upper Permian, roughly between 270 and 252 million years ago. ...

within the Theriodontia. A close relationship between therocephalians and cynodonts had been recognized for many years. In 2001 the Eutheriodontia were defined as the least inclusive clade including

Mammalia A mammal () is a vertebrate animal of the class Mammalia (). Mammals are characterised by the presence of milk-producing mammary glands for feeding their young, a broad neocortex region of the brain, fur or hair, and three middle ear bon ...

and '' Bauria''.James A. Hopson and James W. Kitching, 2001, "A Probainognathian Cynodont from South Africa and the Phylogeny of Nonmammalian Cynodonts" pp 5-35 in: PARISH A. JENKINS, JR., MICHAEL D. SHAPIRO, AND TOMASZ OWERKOWICZ, EDITORS, ''STUDIES IN ORGANISMIC AND EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY IN HONOR OF A. W. CROMPTON'' Bullettin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology. Harvard University 156(1) Even today, the taxon has a strong recognition among paleontologists and is regularly cited in several studies concerning therapsids.

Evolutionary history and characteristics

The therocephalians and cynodonts are thought to have diverged in the Middle Permian, and each group independently evolved mammal-like features, including a

secondary palate The secondary palate is an anatomical structure that divides the nasal cavity from the oral cavity in many vertebrates. In human embryology, it refers to that portion of the hard palate that is formed by the growth of the two palatine shelves med ...

and the loss of a postorbital bar (these features were retained in mammals, which are considered a derived group of cynodonts). Mammalian features that both groups inherited from a common ancestor include the loss of teeth on the

palate The palate () is the roof of the mouth in humans and other mammals. It separates the oral cavity from the nasal cavity. A similar structure is found in crocodilians, but in most other tetrapods, the oral and nasal cavities are not truly sep ...

, the expansion of the epipterygoid bone at the base of the skull (an area called the alisphenoid in mammals), and the narrowing of the

skull roof The skull roof or the roofing bones of the skull are a set of bones covering the brain, eyes and nostrils in bony fishes, including land-living vertebrates. The bones are derived from dermal bone and are part of the dermatocranium. In com ...

to a narrow

sagittal crest A sagittal crest is a ridge of bone running lengthwise along the midline of the top of the skull (at the sagittal suture) of many mammalian and reptilian skulls, among others. The presence of this ridge of bone indicates that there are excepti ...

running between large temporal openings.

References

Theriodontia Guadalupian first appearances {{therapsid-stub