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A new microvertebrate assemblage from the Mussentuchit Member, Cedar Mountain Formation: insights into the paleobiodiversity and paleobiogeography of early Late Cretaceous ecosystems in western North America

The vertebrate fauna of the Late Cretaceous Mussentuchit Member of the Cedar Mountain Formation has been studied for nearly three decades, yet the fossil-rich unit continues to produce new information about life in western North America approximately 97 million years ago. Here we report on the compo...

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Autores principales: Avrahami, Haviv M., Gates, Terry A., Heckert, Andrew B., Makovicky, Peter J., Zanno, Lindsay E.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: PeerJ Inc. 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6241397/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30479889
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5883
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author Avrahami, Haviv M.
Gates, Terry A.
Heckert, Andrew B.
Makovicky, Peter J.
Zanno, Lindsay E.
author_facet Avrahami, Haviv M.
Gates, Terry A.
Heckert, Andrew B.
Makovicky, Peter J.
Zanno, Lindsay E.
author_sort Avrahami, Haviv M.
collection PubMed
description The vertebrate fauna of the Late Cretaceous Mussentuchit Member of the Cedar Mountain Formation has been studied for nearly three decades, yet the fossil-rich unit continues to produce new information about life in western North America approximately 97 million years ago. Here we report on the composition of the Cliffs of Insanity (COI) microvertebrate locality, a newly sampled site containing perhaps one of the densest concentrations of microvertebrate fossils yet discovered in the Mussentuchit Member. The COI locality preserves osteichthyan, lissamphibian, testudinatan, mesoeucrocodylian, dinosaurian, metatherian, and trace fossil remains and is among the most taxonomically rich microvertebrate localities in the Mussentuchit Member. To better refine taxonomic identifications of isolated theropod dinosaur teeth, we used quantitative analyses of taxonomically comprehensive databases of theropod tooth measurements, adding new data on theropod tooth morphodiversity in this poorly understood interval. We further provide the first descriptions of tyrannosauroid premaxillary teeth and document the earliest North American record of adocid remains, extending the appearance of this ancestrally Asian clade by 5 million years in western North America and supporting studies of pre-Cenomaninan Laurasian faunal exchange across Beringia. The overabundance of mesoeucrocodylian remains at the COI locality produces a comparatively low measure of relative biodiversity when compared to other microvertebrate sites in the Mussentuchit Member using both raw and subsampling methods. Much more microvertebrate research is necessary to understand the roles of changing ecology and taphonomy that may be linked to transgression of the Western Interior Seaway or microhabitat variation.
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spelling pubmed-62413972018-11-26 A new microvertebrate assemblage from the Mussentuchit Member, Cedar Mountain Formation: insights into the paleobiodiversity and paleobiogeography of early Late Cretaceous ecosystems in western North America Avrahami, Haviv M. Gates, Terry A. Heckert, Andrew B. Makovicky, Peter J. Zanno, Lindsay E. PeerJ Biodiversity The vertebrate fauna of the Late Cretaceous Mussentuchit Member of the Cedar Mountain Formation has been studied for nearly three decades, yet the fossil-rich unit continues to produce new information about life in western North America approximately 97 million years ago. Here we report on the composition of the Cliffs of Insanity (COI) microvertebrate locality, a newly sampled site containing perhaps one of the densest concentrations of microvertebrate fossils yet discovered in the Mussentuchit Member. The COI locality preserves osteichthyan, lissamphibian, testudinatan, mesoeucrocodylian, dinosaurian, metatherian, and trace fossil remains and is among the most taxonomically rich microvertebrate localities in the Mussentuchit Member. To better refine taxonomic identifications of isolated theropod dinosaur teeth, we used quantitative analyses of taxonomically comprehensive databases of theropod tooth measurements, adding new data on theropod tooth morphodiversity in this poorly understood interval. We further provide the first descriptions of tyrannosauroid premaxillary teeth and document the earliest North American record of adocid remains, extending the appearance of this ancestrally Asian clade by 5 million years in western North America and supporting studies of pre-Cenomaninan Laurasian faunal exchange across Beringia. The overabundance of mesoeucrocodylian remains at the COI locality produces a comparatively low measure of relative biodiversity when compared to other microvertebrate sites in the Mussentuchit Member using both raw and subsampling methods. Much more microvertebrate research is necessary to understand the roles of changing ecology and taphonomy that may be linked to transgression of the Western Interior Seaway or microhabitat variation. PeerJ Inc. 2018-11-16 /pmc/articles/PMC6241397/ /pubmed/30479889 http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5883 Text en © 2018 Avrahami et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
spellingShingle Biodiversity
Avrahami, Haviv M.
Gates, Terry A.
Heckert, Andrew B.
Makovicky, Peter J.
Zanno, Lindsay E.
A new microvertebrate assemblage from the Mussentuchit Member, Cedar Mountain Formation: insights into the paleobiodiversity and paleobiogeography of early Late Cretaceous ecosystems in western North America
title A new microvertebrate assemblage from the Mussentuchit Member, Cedar Mountain Formation: insights into the paleobiodiversity and paleobiogeography of early Late Cretaceous ecosystems in western North America
title_full A new microvertebrate assemblage from the Mussentuchit Member, Cedar Mountain Formation: insights into the paleobiodiversity and paleobiogeography of early Late Cretaceous ecosystems in western North America
title_fullStr A new microvertebrate assemblage from the Mussentuchit Member, Cedar Mountain Formation: insights into the paleobiodiversity and paleobiogeography of early Late Cretaceous ecosystems in western North America
title_full_unstemmed A new microvertebrate assemblage from the Mussentuchit Member, Cedar Mountain Formation: insights into the paleobiodiversity and paleobiogeography of early Late Cretaceous ecosystems in western North America
title_short A new microvertebrate assemblage from the Mussentuchit Member, Cedar Mountain Formation: insights into the paleobiodiversity and paleobiogeography of early Late Cretaceous ecosystems in western North America
title_sort new microvertebrate assemblage from the mussentuchit member, cedar mountain formation: insights into the paleobiodiversity and paleobiogeography of early late cretaceous ecosystems in western north america
topic Biodiversity
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6241397/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30479889
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.5883
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