Acynodon Explained

Acynodon is an extinct genus of eusuchian crocodylomorph from the Late Cretaceous, with fossils found throughout Southern Europe.

Classification

The genus Acynodon contains three species: A. iberoccitanus, A. adriaticus, and A. lopezi. Fossils have been found in France, Spain, Italy, and Romania, dating back to the Santonian and Maastrichtian periods of the Late Cretaceous.[1]

When first described in 1997, it was placed within the family Alligatoridae.[2] New findings a decade later led to it being reclassified as a basal globidontan.[1] Recent studies have since resolved Acynodon as a basal eusuchian crocodylomorph, outside of the Crocodylia crown group, and a close relative to Hylaeochampsa.[3] [4] [5]

Description

The skull of Acynodon is extremely brevirostrine; it had a very short and broad snout compared to other known alligatorids.[6] Its dentition was quite derived, with enlarged molariform teeth and a lack of maxillary and dentary caniniform teeth, presumably an adaptation to feed on slow prey with hard shells.[1] The paravertebral osteoderms of Acynodon were distinctively double-keeled.

A. adriaticus was highly specialized to durophagy, likely in shallow, densely vegetated waters. It had an acute lateral snout profile of A. adriaticus in comparison to the more rounded shape of A. iberoccitanus.[7]

Notes and References

  1. 10.1111/j.1475-4983.2008.00800.x . Delfino . M. . Martin . J. E. . Buffetaut . E. . 2008 . A new species of Acynodon (Crocodylia) from the Upper Cretaceous (Santonian-Campanian) of Villaggio del Pescatore, Italy . . 51 . 5. 1091–1106 . 2008Palgy..51.1091D . free .
  2. Buscalioni . A. D. . Ortega . F. L. . Vasse . D. . 1997 . New crocodiles (Eusuchia: Alligatoroidea) from the Upper Cretaceous of southern Europe . Comptes Rendus de l'Académie des Sciences, Série IIA . 325 . 7 . 525–530 . 10.1016/s1251-8050(97)89872-2. 1997CRASE.325..525B .
  3. Michael S. Y. Lee . Adam M. Yates . 27 June 2018 . Tip-dating and homoplasy: reconciling the shallow molecular divergences of modern gharials with their long fossil . . 285 . 1881 . 10.1098/rspb.2018.1071 . 30051855 . 6030529 . free.
  4. Tobias Massonne . Davit Vasilyan . Márton Rabi . Madelaine Böhme . 2019 . A new alligatoroid from the Eocene of Vietnam highlights an extinct Asian clade independent from extant Alligator sinensis . PeerJ . 7 . e7562 . 10.7717/peerj.7562 . 31720094 . 6839522 . free .
  5. Blanco . A. . Importance of the postcranial skeleton in eusuchian phylogeny: Reassessing the systematics of allodaposuchid crocodylians . 2021 . PLOS ONE . 16 . 6 . e0251900 . 10.1371/journal.pone.0251900. 34106925 . 8189472 . 2021PLoSO..1651900B . free .
  6. 10.1671/0272-4634(2007)27[362:NMOTLC]2.0.CO;2 . Martin . J. E. . 2007 . New material of the Late Cretaceous globidontan Acynodon iberoccitanus (crocodylia) from Southern France . . 27 . 2. 362–372 . 130433177 .
  7. Muscioni . Marco . Chiarenza . Alfio Alessandro . Fernandez . Diego Bladimir Haro . Dreossi . Diego . Bacchia . Flavio . Fanti . Federico . 2024-09-12 . Cranial anatomy of Acynodon adriaticus and extreme durophagous adaptations in Eusuchia (Reptilia: Crocodylomorpha) . The Anatomical Record . en . 10.1002/ar.25574 . 1932-8486. free .

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