Herds overhead: Nimbadon lavarackorum (Diprotodontidae), heavyweight marsupial herbivores in the Miocene forests of Australia.

ABSTRACT: The marsupial family Diprotodontidae (Diprotodontia, Vombatiformes) is a group of extinct large-bodied (60-2500 kg) wombat-like herbivores that were common and geographically widespread in Cenozoic fossil deposits of Australia and New Guinea. Typically they are regarded to be gregarious, terrestrial quadrupeds and have been likened in body form among placental groups to sheep, rhinoceros and hippopotami. Arguably, one of the best represented species is the zygomaturine diprotodontid Nimbadon lavarackorum which is known from exceptionally well-preserved cranial and postcranial material from the middle Miocene cave deposit AL90, in the Riversleigh World Heritage Area, northwestern Queensland. Here we describe and functionally analyse the appendicular skeleton of Nimbadon lavarackorum and rev

SUBMITTER: Black KH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3504027 | biostudies-literature | 2012

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature