1) The palaeoenvironment and biostratigraphical significance of the conchostracans from the Late Triassic fissure deposits of Bristol and South Wales. 2 2) Body size evolution in Parareptilia and the influence of (re-)scaling on macroevolutionary studies 3 3) Evolution of ecospace occupancy by marine reptiles during the Mesozoic 4 4) Conulariid affinity, cnidarian phylogeny and the origin of Eu...

Abstract Non-archosaur archosauromorphs are a paraphyletic group of diapsid reptiles that were important members global Middle and Late Triassic continental ecosystems. Included in this the azendohsaurids, clade allokotosaurians (kuehneosaurids Azendohsauridae + Trilophosauridae) retain plesiomorphic archosauromorph postcranial body plan but evolved disparate cranial features converge on later ...

Birds, dinosaurs, crocodilians, pterosaurs and their close relatives form the highly diverse clade Archosauriformes. Archosauriforms have a deep evolutionary history, originating in the late Permian, prior to the end-Permian mass extinction, and radiating in the Triassic to dominate Mesozoic ecosystems. However, the origins of this clade and its extraordinarily successful body plan remain obscu...

Current characterizations of early dinosaur evolution are incomplete: existing palaeobiological and phylogenetic scenarios are based on a fossil record dominated by saurischians and the implications of the early ornithischian record are often overlooked. Moreover, the timings of deep phylogenetic divergences within Dinosauria are poorly constrained owing to the absence of a rigorous chronostrat...

The only true living endothermic vertebrates are birds and mammals, which produce and regulate their internal temperature quite independently from their surroundings. For mammal ancestors, anatomical clues suggest that endothermy originated during the Permian or Triassic. Here we investigate the origin of mammalian thermoregulation by analysing apatite stable oxygen isotope compositions (δ18Op)...

Morphological similarities indicate that Palaeozoic problematic tubeworms, e.g. tentaculitids, cornulitids, microconchids, trypanoporids, Anticalyptraea, and Tymbochoos, form a monophyletic group. This group may also include hederelloids. Members of this group share affinities with lophophorates and their evolution could have partly been driven by predation. The extinction of Palaeozoic tubewor...

A small accumulation of bones from the Norian (Upper Triassic) of the Seazza Brook Valley (Carnic Prealps, Northern Italy) was originally (1989) identified as a gastric pellet made of pterosaur skeletal elements. The specimen has been reported in literature as one of the very few cases of gastric ejecta containing pterosaur bones since then. However, the detailed analysis of the bones preserved...

Hypuronector limnaios (n. gen., n. sp.) is a small reptile described from the Late Triassic (Late Carnian) age Lockatong Formation of the Newark basin of New Jersey. It occurs in the laminated, relatively deep-water portions of sedimentary cycles controlled by orbital forcing of climate. Hypuronector has uniquely elongated chevrons that give the tail a finor featherlike shape. Hypuronector was ...

–The Late Triassic (Norian) phytosaurs Nicrosaurus kapffi and Mystriosuchus planirostris appear at about the same time in central Europe. Both have very distinctive snout shapes and are thought to occupy different ecological niches. The depositional environment and post-cranial morphology suggest a secondarily terrestrial lifestyle for Nicrosaurus. Some phytosaurs might have exploited coastal h...