Vincelestes ("Vince's thief") is an extinct genus of mammal that lived in what is now
South America during the
Early Cretaceous. It is closely related to modern
therian mammals as part of
Cladotheria.
Description
Vincelestes neuquenianus is the only species known to date. Specimens were found in
La Amarga Formation of southern Neuquén Province,
Argentina. The remains of only nine individuals were recovered from this site.[1]
The back teeth of Vincelestes were similar to those of
therians in that they were capable of cutting and grinding. This enabled them to process food more efficiently.[2]
Diet
In one study on Mesozoic mammal mandibles, Vincelestes plots with herbivorous and omnivorous taxa.[3]
Phylogeny
Although not the direct ancestor of therians, Vincelestes is important because it gives an idea of what the ancestor of both
placental and
marsupial mammals might have looked like, and also gives an indication of when these mammals may have originated.[4]
Some studies inversely recovered the genus as an
australosphenidan,[5][6] although current thought places Vincelestes as sister to marsupials and placental mammals.[7][8][9]
References
^ Guillermo W. Rougier , Agustín G. Martinelli , Analía M. Forasiepi, Mesozoic Mammals from South America and Their Forerunners, 2012
^ Guillermo W. Rougier , Agustín G. Martinelli , Analía M. Forasiepi, Mesozoic Mammals from South America and Their Forerunners, 2012
^Bonaparte, José F. (17 September 2008). "On the phylogenetic relationships of". Historical Biology. 20 (2): 81–86.
doi:
10.1080/08912960802164470.
^Huttenlocker, Adam K.; Grossnickle, David M.; Kirkland, James I.; Schultz, Julia A.; Luo, Zhe-Xi (23 May 2018). "Late-surviving stem mammal links the lowermost Cretaceous of North America and Gondwana". Nature. 558 (7708): 108–112.
Bibcode:
2018Natur.558..108H.
doi:
10.1038/s41586-018-0126-y.
PMID29795343.
^Bi, Shundong; Zheng, Xiaoting; Wang, Xiaoli; Cignetti, Natalie E.; Yang, Shiling; Wible, John R. (13 June 2018). "An Early Cretaceous eutherian and the placental–marsupial dichotomy". Nature. 558 (7710): 390–395.
Bibcode:
2018Natur.558..390B.
doi:
10.1038/s41586-018-0210-3.
PMID29899454.
^ Guillermo W. Rougier , Agustín G. Martinelli , Analía M. Forasiepi, Mesozoic Mammals from South America and Their Forerunners, 2012