A transitional snake from the Late Cretaceous period of North America

Snakes are the most diverse group of lizards, but their origins and early evolution remain poorly understood owing to a lack of transitional forms. Several major issues remain outstanding, such as whether snakes originated in a marine or terrestrial environment and how their unique feeding mechanism evolved. The Cretaceous Coniophis precedens was among the first Mesozoic snakes discovered, but until now only an isolated vertebra has been described and it has therefore been overlooked in discussions of snake evolution. Here we report on previously undescribed material from this ancient snake, including the maxilla, dentary and additional vertebrae. Coniophis is not an anilioid as previously thought a revised phylogenetic analysis of Ophidia shows that it instead represents the most primitive known snake. Accordingly, its morphology and ecology are critical to understanding snake evolution. Coniophis occurs in a continental floodplain environment, consistent with a terrestrial rather than a marine origin; furthermore, its small size and reduced neural spines indicate fossorial habits, suggesting that snakes evolved from burrowing lizards. The skull is intermediate between that of lizards and snakes. Hooked teeth and an intramandibular joint indicate that Coniophis fed on relatively large, soft-bodied prey. However, the maxilla is firmly united with the skull, indicating an akinetic rostrum. Coniophis therefore represents a transitional snake, combining a snake-like body and a lizard-like head. Subsequent to the evolution of a serpentine body and carnivory, snakes evolved a highly specialized, kinetic skull, which was followed by a major adaptive radiation in the Early Cretaceous period. This pattern suggests that the kinetic skull was a key innovation that permitted the diversification of snakes.     

A pug-nosed crocodyliform from the Late Cretaceous of Madagascar

Although the image of crocodyliforms as 'unchanged living fossils' is naive, several morphological features of the group are thought to have varied only within narrow limits during the course of evolution. These include an elongate snout with an array of conical teeth, a dorsoventrally flattened skull and a posteriorly positioned jaw articulation, which provides a powerful bite force. Here we report an exquisitely preserved specimen of a new taxon from the Late Cretaceous of Madagascar that deviates profoundly from this Bauplan, possessing an extremely blunt snout, a tall, rounded skull, an anteriorly shifted jaw joint and clove-shaped, multicusped teeth reminiscent of those of some ornithischian dinosaurs. This last feature implies that the diet of the new taxon may have been predominantly if not exclusively herbivorous. A close relationship with notosuchid crocodyliforms, particularly Uruguaysuchus (Late Cretaceous, Uruguay) is suggested by several shared derived features; this supports a biogeographical hypothesis that Madagascar and South America were linked during the Late Cretaceous.     

A gigantic bird-like dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous of China

An evolutionary trend of decreasing size is present along the line to birds in coelurosaurian theropod evolution, but size increases are seen in many coelurosaurian subgroups, in which large forms are less bird-like. Here we report on a new non-avian dinosaur, Gigantoraptor erlianensis, gen. et sp. nov., from the Late Cretaceous Iren Dabasu Formation of Nei Mongol, China. Although it has a body mass of about 1,400 kg, a phylogenetic analysis positions this new taxon within the Oviraptorosauria, a group of small, feathered theropods rarely exceeding 40 kg in body mass. A histological analysis suggests that Gigantoraptor gained this size by a growth rate considerably faster than large North American tyrannosaurs such as Albertosaurus and Gorgosaurus. Gigantoraptor possesses several salient features previously unknown in any other dinosaur and its hind limb bone scaling and proportions are significantly different from those of other coelurosaurs, thus increasing the morphological diversity among dinosaurs. Most significantly, the gigantic Gigantoraptor shows many bird-like features absent in its smaller oviraptorosaurian relatives, unlike the evolutionary trend seen in many other coelurosaurian subgroups.     

A bizarre predatory dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous of Madagascar

Here we report the discovery of a small-bodied (approximately 1.8 m) predatory dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) of Madagascar. Masiakasaurus knopfleri, gen. et sp. nov., represented by several skull elements and much of the postcranial skeleton, is unique in being the only known theropod with a highly procumbent and distinctly heterodont lower dentition. Such a derived dental morphology is otherwise unknown among dinosaurs. Numerous skeletal characteristics indicate that Masiakasaurus is a member of Abelisauroidea, an enigmatic clade of Gondwanan theropods. Previously, small-bodied abelisauroids were known only from Argentina. The occurrence of Masiakasaurus on Madagascar suggests that small-bodied abelisauroids, like their larger-bodied counterparts, were more cosmopolitan, radiating throughout much of Gondwana and paralleling the diversification of small coelurosaur theropods in Laurasia.     

New evidence on deinonychosaurian dinosaurs from the Late Cretaceous of Patagonia

Most of what is known about the evolution of deinonychosaurs (that is, the group of theropods most closely related to birds) is based on discoveries from North America and Asia. Except for Unenlagia comahuensis and some fragmentary remains from northern Africa, no other evidence was available on deinonychosaurian diversity in Gondwana. Here we report a new, Late Cretaceous member of the clade, Neuquenraptor argentinus gen. et sp. nov., representing uncontroversial evidence of a deinonychosaurian theropod in the Southern Hemisphere. The new discovery demonstrates that Cretaceous theropod faunas from the southern continents shared greater similarity with those of the northern landmasses than previously thought. Available evidence suggests that deinonychosaurians were probably distributed worldwide at least by the beginning of the Cretaceous period. The phylogenetic position of the new deinonychosaur, as well as other Patagonian coelurosaurian theropods, is compatible with a vicariance model of diversification for some groups of Gondwanan and Laurasian dinosaurs.     

A Jurassic mammal from South America

The Jurassic period is an important stage in early mammalian evolution, as it saw the first diversification of this group, leading to the stem lineages of monotremes and modern therian mammals. However, the fossil record of Jurassic mammals is extremely poor, particularly in the southern continents. Jurassic mammals from Gondwanaland are so far only known from Tanzania and Madagascar, and from trackway evidence from Argentina. Here we report a Jurassic mammal represented by a dentary, which is the first, to our knowledge, from South America. The tiny fossil from the Middle to Late Jurassic of Patagonia is a representative of the recently termed Australosphenida, a group of mammals from Gondwanaland that evolved tribosphenic molars convergently to the Northern Hemisphere Tribosphenida, and probably gave rise to the monotremes. Together with other mammalian evidence from the Southern Hemisphere, the discovery of this new mammal indicates that the Australosphenida had diversified and were widespread in Gondwanaland well before the end of the Jurassic, and that mammalian faunas from the Southern Hemisphere already showed a marked distinction from their northern counterparts by the Middle to Late Jurassic.     

The earliest dromaeosaurid theropod from South America

The evolutionary history of Maniraptora, the clade of carnivorous dinosaurs that includes birds and the sickle-clawed Dromaeosauridae, has hitherto been largely restricted to Late Jurassic and Cretaceous deposits on northern continents. The stunning Early Cretaceous diversity of maniraptorans from Liaoning, China, coupled with a longevity implied by derived Late Jurassic forms such as Archaeopteryx, pushes the origins of maniraptoran lineages back to Pangaean times and engenders the possibility that such lineages existed in Gondwana. A few intriguing, but incomplete, maniraptoran specimens have been reported from South America, Africa and Madagascar. Their affinities remain contested, however, and they have been interpreted as biogeographic anomalies relative to other faunal components of these land-masses. Here we describe a near-complete, small dromaeosaurid that is both the most complete and the earliest member of the Maniraptora from South America, and which provides new evidence for a unique Gondwanan lineage of Dromaeosauridae with an origin predating the separation between northern and southern landmasses.     

Transitional mammalian middle ear from a new Cretaceous Jehol eutriconodont

The transference of post-dentary jaw elements to the cranium of mammals as auditory ossicles is one of the central topics in evolutionary biology of vertebrates. Homologies of these bones among jawed vertebrates have long been demonstrated by developmental studies; but fossils illuminating this critical transference are sparse and often ambiguous. Here we report the first unambiguous ectotympanic (angular), malleus (articular and prearticular) and incus (quadrate) of an Early Cretaceous eutriconodont mammal from the Jehol Biota, Liaoning, China. The ectotympanic and malleus have lost their direct contact with the dentary bone but still connect the ossified Meckel's cartilage (OMC); we hypothesize that the OMC serves as a stabilizing mechanism bridging the dentary and the detached ossicles during mammalian evolution. This transitional mammalian middle ear narrows the morphological gap between the mandibular middle ear in basal mammaliaforms and the definitive mammalian middle ear (DMME) of extant mammals; it reveals complex changes contributing to the detachment of ear ossicles during mammalian evolution.     

Migration of a Late Cretaceous fish

Late Cretaceous sediments from the Western Interior of North America yield exceptionally well preserved fossils that serve as proxies for the rapidly changing climate preceding the Cretaceous/Tertiary boundary (about 67-65 Myr ago). Here we reconstruct the ontogenetic history of a Maastrichtian-age fish, Vorhisia vulpes, by using the carbon, oxygen and strontium isotope ratios of four aragonite otoliths collected from the Fox Hills Formation of South Dakota. Individuals of V. vulpes spawned in brackish water (about 70-80% seawater) and during their first year migrated to open marine waters of the Western Interior Seaway, where they remained for 3 years before returning to the estuary, presumably to spawn and die. The mean delta(18)O from the marine growth phase of V. vulpes yields a seawater temperature of 18 degrees C, which is consistent with leaf physiognomy and general-circulation-model temperature estimates for the Western Interior during the latest Maastrichtian.     

High temperatures in the Late Cretaceous Arctic Ocean

To understand the climate dynamics of the warm, equable greenhouse world of the Late Cretaceous period, it is important to determine polar palaeotemperatures. The early palaeoceanographic history of the Arctic Ocean has, however, remained largely unknown, because the sea floor and underlying deposits are usually inaccessible beneath a cover of floating ice. A shallow piston core taken from a drifting ice island in 1970 fortuitously retrieved unconsolidated Upper Cretaceous organic-rich sediment from Alpha ridge, a submarine elevated feature of probable oceanic origin. A lack of carbonate in the sediments from this core has prevented the use of traditional oxygen-isotope palaeothermometry. Here we determine Arctic palaeotemperatures from these Upper Cretaceous deposits using TEX86, a new palaeothermometer that is based on the composition of membrane lipids derived from a ubiquitous component of marine plankton, Crenarchaeota. From these analyses we infer an average sea surface temperature of approximately 15 degrees C for the Arctic Ocean about 70 million years ago. This calibration point implies an Equator-to-pole gradient in sea surface temperatures of approximately 15 degrees C during this interval and, by extrapolation, we suggest that polar waters were generally warmer than 20 degrees C during the middle Cretaceous (approximately 90 million years ago).     

晚侏罗-早白垩世郯庐断裂平移性质的探讨

通过晚侏罗世-早白垩世郯庐断裂带的应力场性质、盆地原型展布及构造环境分析,并结合同一时期大别造山带北缘火山岩主量元素、稀土元素的地球化学特征,认为大别造山带北缘和郯庐断裂带西侧区域为伸展构造环境,主张应力方向为北西西-南东东,郯庐断裂带在晚侏罗世-早白垩世应为右行平移伸展活动.     

Isotopic evidence for Late Cretaceous plume-ridge interaction at the Hawaiian hotspot

When a mantle plume interacts with a mid-ocean ridge, both are noticeably affected. The mid-ocean ridge can display anomalously shallow bathymetry, excess volcanism, thickened crust, asymmetric sea-floor spreading and a plume component in the composition of the ridge basalts. The hotspot-related volcanism can be drawn closer to the ridge, and its geochemical composition can also be affected. Here we present Sr-Nd-Pb isotopic analyses of samples from the next-to-oldest seamount in the Hawaiian hotspot track, the Detroit seamount at 51 degrees N, which show that, 81 Myr ago, the Hawaiian hotspot produced volcanism with an isotopic signature indistinguishable from mid-ocean ridge basalt. This composition is unprecedented in the known volcanism from the Hawaiian hotspot, but is consistent with the interpretation from plate reconstructions that the hotspot was located close to a mid-ocean ridge about 80 Myr ago. As the rising mantle plume encountered the hot, low-viscosity asthenosphere and hot, thin lithosphere near the spreading centre, it appears to have entrained enough of the isotopically depleted upper mantle to overwhelm the chemical characteristics of the plume itself. The Hawaiian hotspot thus joins the growing list of hotspots that have interacted with a rift early in their history.     

论50年代末至60年代前期毛泽东对美强硬态度的原因

50年代末60年代前期毛泽东对美强硬态度的成因主要有三方面因素,一是直接与美国介入金门炮战拒不改变侵华政策有关;二是为了争取"第三世界";三是毛泽东对形势的错误估计.     

湖南花垣中寒武世晚期开腔骨类化石

记述了湖南花垣县排碧剖面寒武系花桥组上部灰岩中的开腔骨类化石。40余块形态多样的化石标本,包括具6-7+1型的Chancelloria altaica;4＋0型Archiasterella sp.;和3＋0型Allonnia sp.;以及形态奇特的开腔骨针Chancelloria sp.,与三叶虫、牙形石、腕足动物、软舌螺类等共生,时代属中寒武世晚期。与其他研究比较证明,这是迄今我国中寒武世晚期开腔骨类最高产出层位,也是世界上少数几个开腔骨类较高的产出层位之一。通过对开腔骨类骨片构造、保存环境及其地史地理分布的分析,认为开腔骨类是一类与海绵类有密切关系、已绝灭的后生动物,是一类生活于浅海环境的底栖固着型生物。     

湖南西部中寒武世形态变异海绵骨针化石

报道湖南西部王村剖面中寒武世灰岩中产出的海绵骨针化石组合。这些海绵骨针化石以二轴四射针、T型针、三轴五射针和五轴五射针为主。骨针形态完整,保存了轴管构造。描述了罕见的,形态变异性极大的(highlymodified)一个新属眩目海绵属Speciosuspongia,两个新种湖南眩目海绵Speciosuspongia hunanensis和王村眩目海绵Speciosuspongia wangcunensis。眩目海绵的主要特点为:两侧对称,硅质,五轴五射,中轴与一条针射重合,另外4条针射分为两对,与中轴重合的针射比其他4条针射粗大。其中,湖南眩目海绵Speciosuspongia hunanensis前射基部或整体膨大成骨板,这一变异体现了海绵骨针的典型变异形态自早寒武世向晚寒武世的过渡,具有重要的演化意义。     

湖南西部中寒武世形态变异海绵骨针化石

报道湖南西部王村剖面中寒武世灰岩中产出的海绵骨针化石组合。这些海绵骨针化石以二轴四射针、T型针、三轴五射针和五轴五射针为主。骨针形态完整,保存了轴管构造。描述了罕见的,形态变异性极大的(highlymodified)一个新属眩目海绵属Speciosuspongia,两个新种湖南眩目海绵Speciosuspongia hunanensis和王村眩目海绵Speciosuspongia wangcunensis。眩目海绵的主要特点为:两侧对称,硅质,五轴五射,中轴与一条针射重合,另外4条针射分为两对,与中轴重合的针射比其他4条针射粗大。其中,湖南眩目海绵Speciosuspongia hunanensis前射基部或整体膨大成骨板,这一变异体现了海绵骨针的典型变异形态自早寒武世向晚寒武世的过渡,具有重要的演化意义。     

Warm tropical sea surface temperatures in the Late Cretaceous and Eocene epochs

Climate models with increased levels of carbon dioxide predict that global warming causes heating in the tropics, but investigations of ancient climates based on palaeodata have generally indicated cool tropical temperatures during supposed greenhouse episodes. For example, in the Late Cretaceous and Eocene epochs there is abundant geological evidence for warm, mostly ice-free poles, but tropical sea surface temperatures are generally estimated to be only 15-23 degrees C, based on oxygen isotope palaeothermometry of surface-dwelling planktonic foraminifer shells. Here we question the validity of most such data on the grounds of poor preservation and diagenetic alteration. We present new data from exceptionally well preserved foraminifer shells extracted from impermeable clay-rich sediments, which indicate that for the intervals studied, tropical sea surface temperatures were at least 28-32 degrees C. These warm temperatures are more in line with our understanding of the geographical distributions of temperature-sensitive fossil organisms and the results of climate models with increased CO2 levels.     

贵州晚三叠世关岭鱼龙的原始尾弯对比研究

通过对贵州关岭上三叠统卡尼阶法郎组瓦窑段地层中的两件关岭鱼龙属标本的观察、测量,并与早侏罗世鱼龙标本对比研究,发现晚三叠世的关岭鱼龙尾椎中部存在一定数量形态发生变化的侧视呈梯形的椎体,已经具有了传统观点认为只在侏罗纪和白垩纪鱼龙中出现的尾弯,弯角为15°左右(侏罗纪鱼龙尾弯弯角可达60°).这一衍生性状的出现表明晚三叠...     

Discovery of Late Cretaceous foraminifera in the Songliao Basin: Evidence from SK-1 and implications for identifying seawater incursions

The Songliao Basin is the largest oil-bearing basin in China.In the absence of sufficient evidence,the possibility of seawater incursion(s) into the Songliao Basin remains controversial.Recently,we discovered relatively abundant foraminifera fossils from units 1 and 2 of the Nenjiang Formation of borehole SK-1.Benthic foraminifera (Gavlinella sp.,Anomalinoides sp.,Pullenia sp.,Haplophragmoides sp.,Karrorulina hokkaidoana,Clavulinoides sp.),as well as planktonic foraminifera (Archaeoglobigerina blowi,Archaeoglobigerina cretacea and Hedbergella flandrini),were identified.These fossils were widely distributed in the marine Cretaceous.According to the global distribution of the above-mentioned planktonic foraminifera,the age of these fossil bearing strata appears to be Late Coniacian to Santonian.More importantly,these foraminifera provide direct evidence for marine water incursions into the Songliao Basin during deposition of the Lower Nenjiang Formation.