The first record of a nyctiphruretid parareptile from the Early Permian of North America, with a discussion of parareptilian temporal fenestration

After a 6-1 loss to Canada, this week’s HSP shows that Russia can’t even score a fossil up on us. Mark MacDougall (Reisz Lab) recent published “The first record of a nyctiphruretid parareptile from the Early Permian of North America, with a discussion of parareptilian temporal fenestration” in Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. This paper describes a new parareptile from the Early Permian (289 ma) of North America: Abyssomedon williamsi. Prior to Marks’ research the group to which this animal belongs was only known from Russia, therefore this new animal extends the geographic distribution of the group considerably (sorry Russia!), as well as pulling the age of it back into the Early Permian. Using a new updated phylogenetic analysis the paper also discusses the extreme variability observed in the temporal openings of the parareptilian skull, and suggests that there was considerable experimentation with this region of the skull over the course of parareptilian evolution.

Congrats, Mark!