July 22 , 2016

by Godzillin

Poco a poco vamos finalizando ya con los trabajos que presentaron varios miembros del Grupo de Biología Evolutiva de la UNED en el XIV Annual Meeting of the European Association of Vertebrate Palaeontologists (EAVP), que tuvo lugar la semana pasada en la ciudad de Haarlem (Holanda). El caso que nos ocupa hoy trata sobre restos sin describir de eosauropterigios de la localidad de Canales de Molina (Guadalajara, España), que incluyen algunos elementos que podrían ser atribuidos al genéro Nothosaurus. Os dejamos con el abstract:

The Spanish record of Triassic sauropterygians is mostly composed of isolated elements of placodonts, pachypleurosaurs, nothosauroids and pistosauroids. These remains represent teeth, vertebrae, ribs, osteoderms and appendicular elements, recovered from several Spanish regions (i.e. Aragon, Catalonia, Balearic Islands, Castilla-La Mancha and Andalusia). We present here several undescribed sauropterygian remains from the Muschelkalk of Guadalajara (Castilla-La Mancha, Spain).
These remains were discovered in 1980 near the locality of Canales de Molina (Guadalajara) in dolomitic limestones from the Middle Triassic of the Royuela Dolostones, Marls and Limestones Formation (Muschelkalk Facies). The vertebrate remains from Canales de Molina include teeth and scales of fishes, and vertebrae, osteoderms, teeth and appendicular elements of placodonts and eosauropterygians.
Several platycoelous vertebral centra with the “cruciform” articular surface that is characteristic for the Eosauropterygia were identified. Neural arches with different sizes and morphologies attributable to this clade have also been recovered. The proximal and distal fragments of a humerus are also preserved, as well as some femoral remains. Several characters observed in the vertebral centra and in the appendicular elements exhibit a similar condition as forms such as Nothosaurus and thereby permit attribution of the Canales de Molina remains to Nothosauridae. In addition, the teeth recovered from Canales de Molina are curved and have ornamented enamel, as is also characteristic of the clade Nothosauridae. The isolated remains from Canales de Molina correspond to several individuals of nothosaurs that range from small to medium size. The attribution of these elements to different taxa or to different ontogenetic stages of a single taxon is evaluated here.