A Review of the Eocene Rodents of Pakistan

19-35http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/48510/2/ID362.pd

Chorlakkia hassani, A New Middle Eocene Dichobunid (Mammalia, Artiodactyla) from the Kuldana Formation of Kohat (Pakistan)

117-124http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/48496/2/ID347.pd

Reconnaissance Survey and Vertebrate Paleontology of Some Paleocene and Eocene Formations in Pakistan

105-116http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/48495/2/ID346.pd

Complete Primate Skeleton from the Middle Eocene of Messel in Germany: Morphology and Paleobiology

The best European locality for complete Eocene mammal skeletons is Grube Messel, near Darmstadt, Germany. Although the site was surrounded by a para-tropical rain forest in the Eocene, primates are remarkably rare there, and only eight fragmentary specimens were known until now. Messel has now yielded a full primate skeleton. The specimen has an unusual history: it was privately collected and sold in two parts, with only the lesser part previously known. The second part, which has just come to light, shows the skeleton to be the most complete primate known in the fossil record.We describe the morphology and investigate the paleobiology of the skeleton. The specimen is described as Darwinius masillae n.gen. n.sp. belonging to the Cercamoniinae. Because the skeleton is lightly crushed and bones cannot be handled individually, imaging studies are of particular importance. Skull radiography shows a host of teeth developing within the juvenile face. Investigation of growth and proportion suggest that the individual was a weaned and independent-feeding female that died in her first year of life, and might have attained a body weight of 650-900 g had she lived to adulthood. She was an agile, nail-bearing, generalized arboreal quadruped living above the floor of the Messel rain forest.Darwinius masillae represents the most complete fossil primate ever found, including both skeleton, soft body outline and contents of the digestive tract. Study of all these features allows a fairly complete reconstruction of life history, locomotion, and diet. Any future study of Eocene-Oligocene primates should benefit from information preserved in the Darwinius holotype. Of particular importance to phylogenetic studies, the absence of a toilet claw and a toothcomb demonstrates that Darwinius masillae is not simply a fossil lemur, but part of a larger group of primates, Adapoidea, representative of the early haplorhine diversification

NEW DENTAL AND POSTCRANIAL REMAINS FROM A SINGLE POPULATION OF PALAEOSTYLOPS FROM THE LATE PALEOCENE OF THE FLAMING CLIFFS IN MONGOLIA

The famous Flaming Cliffs area in Mongolia has long been known to yield abundant Cretaceous (Djadohkta Fm.) and early Paleogene (Khashat Fm.) fossil vertebrates. This region was revisited in 1999 with D. Dashzeveg. During fieldwork at the Gashato locality, a small fossiliferous sandy lens (<1 m3) in Member 1 of the late Paleocene Khashat Formation was completely excavated and screen-washed. Except some rare mixodont remains, the mammal fossils in this lens consist of remains of the arctostylopid Palaeostylops. Over 250 upper and lower jaw fragments are recorded, representing both described species of Palaeostylops, with a minimum number of 24 individuals for P. iturus and 15 for P. macrodon. The finding of such a concentration of individuals may have important implications for the ecology of arctostylopids. The high number of dental remains from a single lens allows to illustrate the morphometric and morphological variability of both forms from a single population. Documenting the variability in both forms is important because they have been variously suggested to represent one sexually dimorphic species, two separate species or even two separate genera. Study of these new fossil specimens will therefore provide a test of these different taxonomical interpretations. Until recently, the Asian and North American Arctostylopidae were only known by dental remains, and they were generally allied with the endemic South American Notoungulata. A recent study of the first unambiguously identified arctostylopid tarsals however suggested that arctostylopids are not notoungulates, but instead are a family of non-gliroid Gliriformes, and moreover characterised Palaeostylops as a moderately specialised cursorial or saltatorial form. The arctostylopid fossils reported here not only include fossil teeth and tarsals, but also previously unknown other postcranial remains, including a distal part of a humerus, a proximal part of a femur and a distal part of a tibia. These new elements can therefore give additional insights in both the phylogeny and the locomotory habits of the poorly known arctostylopids

Un exemple de correlation biostratigraphique entre echelles marines et continentales dans l'Eocene: la coupe de Pontils (bassin de l'Ebre, Espagne). | [(Biostratigraphic correlations between marine and continental Eocene timescales: the Pontils section, Ebre Basin, Spain).]

Peer Reviewe

Gisements à vertébrés du Paléogène de la zone orientale du Bassin de l'Ebre et leur apport à la Stratigraphie.

Peer Reviewe

Early Tertiary mammals from North Africa reinforce the molecular Afrotheria clade

The phylogenetic pattern and timing of the radiation of mammals, especially the geographical origins of major crown clades, are areas of controversy among molecular biologists, morphologists and palaeontologists. Molecular phylogeneticists have identified an Afrotheria clade, which includes several taxa as different as tenrecs (Tenrecidae), golden moles (Chrysochloridae), elephant-shrews (Macroscelididae), aardvarks (Tubulidentata) and paenungulates (elephants, sea cows and hyracoids). Molecular data also suggest a Cretaceous African origin for Afrotheria within Placentalia followed by a long period of endemic evolution on the Afro-Arabian continent after the mid-Cretaceous Gondwanan breakup (approx. 105–25 Myr ago). However, there was no morphological support for such a natural grouping so far. Here, we report new dental and postcranial evidence of Eocene stem hyrax and macroscelidid from North Africa that, for the first time, provides a congruent phylogenetic view with the molecular Afrotheria clade. These new fossils imply, however, substantial changes regarding the historical biogeography of afrotheres. Their long period of isolation in Africa, as assumed by molecular inferences, is now to be reconsidered inasmuch as Eocene paenungulates and elephant-shrews are here found to be related to some Early Tertiary Euramerican ‘hyopsodontid condylarths’ (archaic hoofed mammals). As a result, stem members of afrotherian clades are not strictly African but also include some Early Paleogene Holarctic mammals