Melanosuchus

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Melanosuchus
Temporal range: Late Miocene-Present, 11.6–0 Ma
Black-Caiman-(cropped).jpg
Scientific classification e
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Reptilia
Order: Crocodilia
Family: Alligatoridae
Subfamily: Caimaninae
Clade: Jacarea
Genus: Melanosuchus
Gray, 1862
Species
  • †Melanosuchus fisheri
  • †Melanosuchus latrubessei
  • Melanosuchus niger

Melanosuchus is a genus of alligatorid caiman. The black caiman of South America is the sole extant (living) species, and is the largest living member of the subfamily caimaninae, and the entire alligator family.

Taxonomy[]

Extant species[]

There is one extant species:

  • Melanosuchus niger (Spix, 1825) - known as the Black caiman, native to the Amazon basin of South America

Fossil species[]

Fossil species are known from the Late Miocene of South America and include:

  • Melanosuchus latrubessei Souza-Filho et al, 2020 - discovered in the Solimões Formation of Brazil, dating from the Upper Miocene[1]
  • Melanosuchus fisheri Medina, 1976 - from the Urumaco Formation of Venezuela, dating from the Late Miocene, but now considered as nomen dubium[1][2]

Phylogeny[]

Melanosuchus is a member of the subfamily Caimaninae, which contains the two other extant genera Caiman and Paleosuchus, all of which are native to South and Central America. The below cladogram shows the relationships of all extant genera within Crocodilia (excluding separate extinct taxa), based on molecular phylogenetic studies.[3][4][5][6]

Crocodilia
Alligatoridae
Caimaninae
 
 

Caiman Caiman crocodilus llanos white background.JPG

 
 

Melanosuchus Melanosuchus niger white background.jpg

 
 
 

Paleosuchus Dwarf Caiman white background.jpg

 
 
Alligatorinae

Alligator Alligator white background.jpg

 
 
Longirostres
Crocodylidae
 

Crocodylus Siamese Crocodile white background.jpg

 
 
 

Mecistops Crocodylus cataphractus faux-gavial d'Afrique2 white background.JPG

 
 

Osteolaemus Bristol.zoo.westafrican.dwarf.croc.arp. white background.jpg

 
 
 
Gavialidae
 

Gavialis Gavialis gangeticus (Gharial, Gavial) white background.jpg

 
 

Tomistoma Tomistoma schlegelii. white background.JPG

 
 
 
 


References[]

  1. ^ a b Souza-Filho, J.P. (2020). "On a new Melanosuchus species (Alligatoroidea: Caimaninae) from Solimões Formation (Eocene-Pliocene), Northern Brazil, and evolution of Caimaninae" (PDF). Zootaxa. 4894 (4): 561–593. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.4894.4.5.
  2. ^ Bona, Paula; Blanco, M. Victoria Fernandez; Schever, Torsten M.; Both, Christian (2017). "Shedding Light on the Taxonomic Diversity of the South American Miocene Caimans: The Status of Melanosuchus fisheri (Crocodylia, Alligatoroidea)". Ameghiniana. 54 (6): 681–687. doi:10.5710/AMGH.08.06.2017.3103.
  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". Proceedings of the Royal Society B. 285 (1881). doi:10.1098/rspb.2018.1071. PMC 6030529. PMID 30051855.
  4. ^ Hekkala, E.; Gatesy, J.; Narechania, A.; Meredith, R.; Russello, M.; Aardema, M. L.; Jensen, E.; Montanari, S.; Brochu, C.; Norell, M.; Amato, G. (2021-04-27). "Paleogenomics illuminates the evolutionary history of the extinct Holocene "horned" crocodile of Madagascar, Voay robustus". Communications Biology. 4 (1): 505. doi:10.1038/s42003-021-02017-0. ISSN 2399-3642. PMC 8079395. PMID 33907305.
  5. ^ Rio, Jonathan P.; Mannion, Philip D. (6 September 2021). "Phylogenetic analysis of a new morphological dataset elucidates the evolutionary history of Crocodylia and resolves the long-standing gharial problem". PeerJ. 9: e12094. doi:10.7717/peerj.12094. PMC 8428266. PMID 34567843.
  6. ^ Gatesy, J.; Amato, G. (2008). "The rapid accumulation of consistent molecular support for intergeneric crocodylian relationships". Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. 48 (3): 1232–1237. doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2008.02.009. PMID 18372192.
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