Patagorhynchus is a genus of prehistoric monotreme mammal from the Late Cretaceous (early Maastrichtian) Chorrillo Formation of Santa Cruz Province, Argentina. The genus contains a single species, Patagorhynchus pascuali. The holotype, MPM-PV-23087, consists of a lower right molar attached to a fragment of the dentary. It was collected near Rio Gallegos, Santa Cruz, Argentina in 2022 and is housed in the Museo Padre Molina.[1]
| Patagorhynchus Temporal range: Late Cretaceous, early | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Holotype specimen | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Monotremata |
| Family: | Ornithorhynchidae (?) |
| Genus: | †Patagorhynchus Chimento et al., 2023 |
| Species: | †P. pascuali |
| Binomial name | |
| †Patagorhynchus pascuali Chimento et al., 2023 | |
Etymology
The genus name comes from Patago, referring to Patagonia and Greek rhynchus, meaning nose. The species name pascuali honors Argentine paleomammalogist Rosendo Pascual.[1]
Evolution
Patagorynchus represents the oldest known monotreme species from South America, indicating that they had already arrived in the region by the end of the Cretaceous, and were present in Antarctica during the Late Cretaceous.[2][1]
Classification
Chimento et al. (2023) recovered Patagorhynchus as a monotreme mammal. The simplified results of their phylogenetic analyses are shown in the cladogram below:[1]
| Monotremaformes |
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
References
Wikiwand in your browser!
Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.
Every time you click a link to Wikipedia, Wiktionary or Wikiquote in your browser's search results, it will show the modern Wikiwand interface.
Wikiwand extension is a five stars, simple, with minimum permission required to keep your browsing private, safe and transparent.
