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This fossil relative of living lizards, such as Varanus lizards, Gila monsters, and Lucio (Angus fragilis), was identified in a museum collection stored in the 1950s, which included specimens from a quarry near Tortworth, in Gloucestershire, in the southwest of England, But then the necessary technology was not there to expose its contemporary features.
As a modern type lizard, the new fossil affects all estimates of the origin of lizards and snakes, which are collectively known as Squamata, and influences assumptions about their rates of evolution, and even the main trigger for the origin of the cluster.
The team, led by Dr David Whiteside from Bristol’s School of Geosciences, have named their startling discovery Cryptovaranoides microlanius, meaning “little butcher”, after their jaws full of sharp teeth. Publish the results in Science Advances.
He recalled in a statement: “The first time I saw the specimen was in a cupboard full of Clevosaurus fossils in the storerooms of the Natural History Museum in London, where I am a scientific colleague. It was a fossil of a common reptile, a close relative of the New Zealand tuatara and the sole survivor of the group,” Rhynchoce recalled in a statement. “, which diverged from Lepidoptera more than 240 million years ago. Our specimen was simply named “Clevosaurus and Other Reptiles.” We examined the specimen, becoming more and more convinced that it was in fact more closely related to living lizards than to the group of tuatara.”
He continues, “We did an X-ray scan of the fossils at the university, and this allowed us to reconstruct the fossil in three dimensions, and to see all the small bones that were hidden inside the rock.”
‘Cryptovaranoides’ is clearly a cochineal, because it differs from ‘Rhynchocephal’ in the brain, in the cervical vertebrae, in the shoulder region, in the presence of a middle upper tooth in the front of the mouth, in the way the teeth are placed on a shelf in the jaws (rather than being fused to the apex of the jaws), and in the structure of the skull, such that there is no inferior temporal band.
There is only one important primitive feature not found in modern pelages, and that is an opening on one side of the end of the humerus, the humerus, through which an artery and nerve pass. Cryptovaranoides has other primitive characters, such as a few rows of teeth on the palatal bones, but experts have observed the same thing in the living European glass lizard, and many snakes, such as boas and pythons, have several rows of large teeth. Same area. Despite this, it is as well developed as most living lizards in its thorax, and the bony connections to the skull indicate that it was flexible.
Professor Mike Benton, co-author of the study, said: “In terms of significance, our fossils trace the origin and diversification of pangolins from the middle Jurassic to the late Triassic. This was a time of great restructuring of terrestrial ecosystems with the emergence of new groups of plants, especially conifers of the type modern, as well as new species of insects, and some of the first modern groups such as turtles, crocodiles, dinosaurs, and mammals.”
“If you add the older modern squamates, the picture is complete,” he continues. “It seems that these new plants and animals appeared on the scene as part of a great reconstruction of life on Earth after the mass extinction at the end of the Permian period, 252 million years ago, and especially from the Carnian Pluvial ring, 232 million years ago, when climates swung between wet and dry and caused In great turmoil in life.”
PhD student Sophia Champy-Trowell commented: “The animal’s new name, ‘Cryptovaranoides microlanius’, reflects the cryptic nature of the staircase beast, but also its likely lifestyle, living in limestone crevices on the islets that existed around Bristol at the time. The species name, meaning “little butcher,” refers to its jaws full of sharp, cutting teeth, as it preys on arthropods and small vertebrates.
Dr Whiteside concludes: ‘This is a very special fossil and is likely to become one of the most important fossils found in recent decades. It is fortunate that it is in a national collection, in this case the Natural History Museum in London. We would like to thank the late Pamela L. Robinson who recovered the fossils from the quarry and did a great job preparing the fossils.”
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