Macelognathus
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Macelognathus is an extinct genus of sphenosuchian crocodylomorph from the Late Jurassic. Originally it was believed be a turtle and later a dinosaur. It lived in what is now Wyoming, in North America.[1][2]
The type species, Macelognathus vagans, was described by Othniel Charles Marsh in 1884 as a turtle based on a partial jaw from the Late Jurassic Morrison Formation at Como Bluff, Wyoming.[3] After being referred to the Dinosauria by Moodie in 1908,[1] it was later reclassified by Ostrom in 1971 as a crocodilian relative.[4] Based on new material from the Morrison Formation at Fruita, Colorado, in 2005 Göhlich et al. identified it as a basal crocodylomorph ("sphenosuchian").[5] It is considered an example of convergent evolution, due to the similarities to caenagnathid dinosaurs, with which it was not closely related. It was between Template:Convert long.
It is possibly a junior synonym of Hallopus victor.[5]
References
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- ↑ a b Moodie, R.L. 1908. The relationship of the turtles and plesiosaurs. Kansas University Scientific Bulletin, 4: 319–327.
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Marsh, O.C. 1884. A new order of extinct Jurassic reptiles (Macelognatha). American Journal of Sciences 27(3): 341.
- ↑ Ostrom, J.H. (1971). "On the systematic position of Macelognathus vagans". Postilla 153:1-10.
- ↑ a b Göhlich, U., L.M. Chiappe, J.M. Clark, and H.-D. Sues (2005) The systematic position of the Late Jurassic alleged dinosaur Macelognathus (Crocodylomorpha: Sphenosuchia). Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 42: 307–321.