Diaphorocetus | |
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Diaphorocetus poucheti skull | |
Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Mammalia |
Order: | Artiodactyla |
Infraorder: | Cetacea |
Superfamily: | Physeteroidea |
Family: | incertae sedis |
Genus: | †
Diaphorocetus Ameghino, 1894 |
Species | |
D. poucheti ( type) | |
Synonyms | |
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Diaphorocetus is an extinct genus of odontocete cetacean belonging to Physeteroidea. Its remains were found in the Monte León Formation of Argentina, dating to the Early Miocene. [1]
Diaphorocetus was originally named Mesocetus by Moreno (1892). [2] Lydekker (1893) found that Mesocetus was already in use for an extinct mysticete, so he renamed the sperm whale Hypocetus. [3] Ameghino (1894) too recognized Moreno's name as preoccupied, but unaware of Lydekker's paper, coined his own replacement name Diaphorocetus for Mesocetus. [4] Diaphorocetus was declared a nomen protectum (protected name) by Paolucci et al. (2019) because Hypocetus and Paracetus have not been used as valid since 1899 under Article 23.9 of the Code. [5]
The small teeth of Diaphorocetus and the bottleneck-like nature of the rostrum suggest that Diaphorocetus employed a feeding strategy intermediate between that of raptorial sperm whales like Acrophyseter and Livyatan and extant sperm whales. [5]