A primitive actinopterygian braincase from the Tournaisian of Nova Scotia.

ABSTRACT: The vertebrate fossil record of the earliest Carboniferous is notoriously poorly sampled, obscuring a critical interval in vertebrate evolution and diversity. Recent studies of diversity across the Devonian-Carboniferous boundary have proposed a vertebrate mass extinction at the end-Devonian, and recent phylogenies suggest that the origin of the actinopterygian crown may have occurred in the earliest Carboniferous, as part of a broader recovery fauna. However, the data necessary to test this are limited. Here, we describe a partial actinopterygian skull, including diagnostic elements of the posterior braincase, from the Tournaisian Horton Bluff Formation of Blue Beach, Nova Scotia. The braincase surprisingly shows a confluence of characters common in Devonian taxa but absent in Mississippi

SUBMITTER: Wilson CD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5990821 | biostudies-literature | 2018 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature