''Pachygenys'' ("thick jaw") is a genus of

scincomorpha Scincomorpha is an infraorder and clade of lizards including skinks (Scincidae) and their close relatives. These include the living families Cordylidae (girdled lizards), Gerrhosauridae (plated lizards), and Xantusiidae (night lizards), as well a ...

n lizard from the

Lower Cretaceous Lower may refer to: * ''Lower'' (album), 2025 album by Benjamin Booker * Lower (surname) * Lower Township, New Jersey *Lower Receiver (firearms) * Lower Wick Gloucestershire, England See also * Nizhny {{Disambiguation ...

Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...

, ''P. thlastesa'' from the Doushan Formation,

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

, and ''P. adachii'' from the

Ohyamashimo Formation The Ohyamashimo Formation(大山下層) is an Early Cretaceous (Albian) geologic formation in Japan. It has been dated to the early-mid Albian, between 112.1 ± 0.4 Ma and 106.4 ± 0.4 Ma. Dinosaur remains have been discovered from this formatio ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. Its name is composed of the

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

words παχυς ''pachys'' ("thick") and γένυς ''génys'' ("jaw").

Description

''Pachygenys'' has a few defining characters, of which include a distinct foreshortening of the dentary tooth row and a reduced amount of dentary teeth. ''P. adachii'' differs from ''P. thlastesa'' in a few aspects; ''P. adachii'' has a shorter tooth row than ''P. thlastesa'', as well as anterior and middle teeth that have uncuspid crowns and posterior teeth with simple, uncuspid conical crowns.

References

Early Cretaceous reptiles of Asia Extinct animals of Japan Fossil taxa described in 1999 Scincomorpha Prehistoric reptile genera Fossils of Japan {{paleo-lizard-stub