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Wutuchelys eocenica n. gen. n. sp., an Eocene stem testudinoid turtle from Wutu, Shandong Province, China

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 November 2017

HAIYAN TONG*
Affiliation:
Palaeontological Research and Education Centre, Mahasarakham University, Kantarawichai, Mahasarakham 44150, Thailand Key Laboratory of Vertebrate Evolution and Human Origins of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Science, Beijing 100044, China
JULIEN CLAUDE
Affiliation:
Institut des Sciences de l’Évolution (UM2, CNRS, IRD, EPHE), cc64, Université Montpellier, Place Eugène Bataillon, F-34095 Montpellier Cedex 05, France
CHENG-SEN LI
Affiliation:
State Key Laboratory of Systematic and Evolutionary Botany, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xiangshan, Beijing 100093, China
JIAN YANG
Affiliation:
State Key Laboratory of Systematic and Evolutionary Botany, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xiangshan, Beijing 100093, China
THIERRY SMITH
Affiliation:
Directorate Earth & History of Life, Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, 29 rue Vautier B-1000 Brussels, Belgium
*
Author for correspondence: htong09@yahoo.fr

Abstract

We describe here a new turtle from the early Eocene of Wutu, Shandong Province, China. This turtle with a full row of well-developed inframarginal scutes is assigned to the basalmost testudinoids while stem testudinoids were believed to disappear by the Palaeocene–Eocene boundary. This account shows that stem testudinoids crossed this boundary in their original range. The first comprehensive phylogenetic analysis of stem and modern testudinoids performed here demonstrates that the stem testudinoids, previously placed in the family ‘Lindholmemydidae’, do not form a monophyletic group, and the two major clades of testudinoids (Emydidae and Geoemydidae+Testudinidae) split one from another well before the Palaeocene/Eocene boundary, prior to the Late Cretaceous.

Type
Original Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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