Table of Content

15 March 2003, Volume 41 Issue 01

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FIRST OCCURRENCE OF ACANTHODIAN MICROFOSSILS FROM THE EARLY DEVONIAN OF LIJIANG, YUNNAN, CHINA

WANG Wei

2003, 41(01):  1-16. 

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Acanthodian scales were discovered from the Shanjiang Formation and the Alengchu Formation (Early Devonian) in Alengchu area, Mingyin District, Lijiang County, Yunnan, China. 4 scale genera and 5 scale species are described with 1 new genus and 2 new species. This is the first report on the occurrence of acanthodian fossils in Tibet2western Yunnan region. Different from the Early Devonian acanthodian constitution in South China region, the Early Devonian acanthodian assemblage at Alengchu mainly consists of the genera and species of Climatiida, lacking representatives of Ischnacanthida. It suggests many similarities to the assemblage of the same age in Centeral New South Wales, Australia. This paper is from the author’s master thesis supervised by Professor Wang Nianzhong. The materials described are housed in the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP), Beijing, China.

RESTUDY OF BIS HANOPLIOSAURUS YOUNGI DONG 1980, A FRESH-WATER PLESIOSAURIAN FROM THE JURASSIC OF CHONGQING

SATO Tamaki, LI Chun, WU XiaoChun

2003, 41(01):  17-33. 

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Bishanopliosaurus youngi Dong, 1980 from the Jurassic Dongyuemiao Member of the Ziliujing Formation in Chongqing Municipality, China is redescribed in detail. The holotype of B. youngi is the postcranial skeleton of a young individual, but so far the most complete plesiosaurian fossil known from the Asian Jurassic. Our restudy indicates that B. youngi can be diagnosed by the bifurcated sacral ribs combined with the compressed neural spine, narrow coracoid, and the humerus with a peculiar projection. B. youngi is a valid taxon, but its phylogenetic relationships with other plesiosaurians remain uncertain mainly because of the lack of cranial features. Previous studies on the Dongyuemiao fauna and flora indicate that the sediments are of subtropical freshwater origin. The discovery of B. youngi added further information on the freshwater invasion of plesiosaurians. Freshwater plesiosaurians so far known are very fragmentary, but their wide geographic and temporal distributions suggest that the presence of plesiosaurians in freshwater environment was not uncommon in most of their history.

TWO NEW PTERODACTYLOID PTEROSAURS FROM THE EARLY CRETACEOUS JIUFOTANG FORMATION OF WESTERN LIAONING,CHINA

WANG XiaoLin, ZHOU ZhongHe

2003, 41(01):  34-41. 

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　　In this paper we report two new pterodactyloid pterosaurs from the Jiufotang Formation in western Liaoning Province of northeast China. They are Chaoyangopterus zhangi gen. et sp. nov. (Nyctosauridae) and Liaoningopterus gui gen. et sp. nov. (Anhangueridae). The former not only represents the first such record in Asia but also the earliest record and most complete skeleton of the family. Some revisions of the family are made, such as having four wing digits and well-developed manual digits I~III. Liaoningopterus is the largest pterosaur ever discovered in China; its teeth also represent the largest known from any pterosaurs. Discoveries of two more pterosaurs from the Jiufotang Formation further show that two pterosaur assemblages could be recognized in the Jehol Group, represented by the Yixian Formation and Jiufotang Formation, respectively. The pterosaur assemblage of the Jiufotang Formation shows a lot resemblance to that of the Early Cretaceous Santana Formation (Aptian/ Albian) such as the Tapejaridae and Anhangueridae. The age of the Jiufotang Formation (Aptian) is slightly older than the Santana Formation.

MAMMALIAN REMAINS FROM THE LATE PALEOCENE OF JIASHAN, ANHUI

2003, 41(01):  42-54. 

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The IVPP and Anhui Provincial Geological Bureau joint team had made several times of paleontological investigation in Tujinshan Area, Jiashan County, Anhui Province since 1970’s, resulting in finding a relatively rich Paleogene mammalian fauna. Apart from Sinonyx jiashanensis (Zhou et al. ,1995) and Sinomylus zhaii (Mckenna and Meng ,2000), seven species belonging to five orders of Mammalia are described in the present paper, which not only increase the faunal content but also provide important evidence for the geological age of the fossil2bearing bed.

YUESTHONYX, A NEW TILLODONT ( MAMMALIA) FROM THE PALEOCENE OF HENAN

TONG YongSheng, WANG Jing Wen, FU JingFang

2003, 41(01):  55-65. 

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This paper reports a new tillodont species, Yuesthonyx tingae gen. et sp. nov., belonging to a new family, Yuesethonychidae. The new taxa is created based on the materials collected from the Late Paleocene Dazhang Formation of the Tantou Basin, Henan Province, in 1978. The associated mammal fossil in the Dazhang Formation is a mandible of pseudictopid (Anagalida) (Tong and Wang, 1980). We also briefly review the Asian tillodonts and noticed the tillodonts were diversified during Early Paleocens.

CENOZOIC STRATIGRAPHY IN DANGHE AREA, GANSU PROVINCE, AND UPLIFT OF TIBETAN PLATEAU

WANG BanYue, QIU ZhanXiang, WANG XiaoMing, XIE GuangPu, XIE JunYi, W. Downs, QIU ZhuDing, DENG Tao

2003, 41(01):  66-75. 

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The Danghe area, located in the western2most part of the Gansu Province, is southerly bordered by the Tibetan Plateau. It is one of the classic areas in the Asian Paleogene biostratigraphy. Early in the 1930s Bohlin explored this area and collected plenty of mammalian fossils. However, he did not further subdivide the strata he surveyed, nor did he name the strata or give clear indication of the fossil levels. The main reason of his hesitation was the extremely complex tectonic structure of the area (Bohlin, 1937, 1942, 1945, 1946, 1960). Since the 1950s the Danghe strata have been variously assigned to formations founded in the Yumen Basin more than 200 km to the northeast, such as Huoshaogou, Baiyanghe, Shulehe formations and Yumen Gravels. However, no detailed lithologic comparison between the Danghe area and Yumen Basin has ever been carried out. Furthermore, the stratigraphic position of Bohlin’s fossils has never been satisfactorily clarified. Since the 1990s when the Tibetan Plateau became an area of intense studies, the Danghe area has gained worldwide attention among geologists. Tectonic and paleomagnetic study has been conducted there. Unfortunately, all these endeavors were based on outdated or wrong stratigraphic data (Wang, 1997; Guo and Xiang, 1998; Gilder at al., 2001, Van de Woerd et al., 2001). In 1999 and 2001, a joint team of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences (IVPP), the Cultural Relic Archaeology Institute of Gansu and the Gansu Provincial Museum made geologic survey of the Danghe area. As a result, a number of stratigraphic problems were clarified based primarily on new interpretation of the rock sequences and the newly found mammalian fossils.

THE DISCOVERY OF PLIOPITHECUS FROM NORTHERN JUNGGAR BASIN, XINJIANG

WU Wen Yu, MENG Jin, YE Jie

2003, 41(01):  76-86. 

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A new species of Pliopithecus - P. bii sp. nov., is erected on dental morphology of m2～m3 and a central lower incisor, which were collected from the early Middle Miocene Halamagai Formation of Tieersihabahe in the northern Junggar Basin of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, China. The new species is especially characterized by a deep buccal funnel, which is enclosed by the cristid obliqua, the crest descending along the buccal slope of protoconid, and the buccal branch of prehypocristid. One P4 collected from near the same locality is assigned to Pliopithecus sp. because of its smaller size in relation to the m2 and m3. The associated mammal fauna of P. bii is approximately comparable to Tongxin fauna. Consequently P. bii is of early Middle Miocene in age, equivalent to the European Neogene land mammal age MN6. The high similarity between Dionysopithecus shuangouensis and Pliopithecus especially P. bii supports the inference made by Harrison and Gu (1999) that pliopithecini (Pliopithecus) was derived from an Asian rather than an African source.

NURYCTES, A NEW GENERIC NAME TO REPLACE N EORYCTES TONG, 1997 (MAMMALIA, ?INSECTIVORA, PALAEORYCTIDAE)

TONG YongSheng

2003, 41(01):  88-88. 

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Recently, Drs. Averianov and Lopatin kindly informed that the generic name Neoryctes Tong (1997) for an Eocene Palaeoryctid of central China was preoccupied by a South American scarabaeid (Insecta, Coleoptera) (Arrow, 1908). The scarabaeid genus, Neoryctes, was later considered as a synonym of Neobothynus in Arrow’s coleopterous catalogue, so that the name is abandoned in the recent coleopterous literatures. Here I propose the new generic name Nuryctes to replace Neoryctes Tong (1997). Drs. Averianov and Lopatin of the Russian Academy of Sciences are thanked for their kind concern and suggestion, and thanks are also due to Prof. Zhang Youwei of the Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences for his help.