A New Genus of Geoemydid Tur Tle from Asia

AB STRACT.– Phylo gen etic anal y sis of mi to chon drial gene se quence vari a tion in geoemydid tur tles sug gests that the ge nus Geoemyda as cur rently rec og nized is polyphyletic, and that Geoemyda yuwonoi is the sis ter taxon to Notochelys platynota (but the two are highly ge net i cally di ver gent). We herein place Geoemyda yuwonoi in a new monotypic ge nus, Leucocephalon, dis tin guished by its maxillary con tact, its lack of a quadratojugal, its large an te rior plastral but tresses, its humeropectoral seam pos te rior to the entoplastron, its long interanal seam, its pri mar ily pos te ri orly di rected neurals (dis tinctly con fig ured), and its lack of a plastral hinge.