Early–middle Permian Mediterranean gorgonopsian suggests an equatorial origin of therapsids | Nature Communications
Gorgonopsians were sabre toothed therapsids, a group that is ancestral to mammals. The authors here describe a gorgonopsian from the early–middle Permian of Mallorca, suggesting that therapsids originated in tropical regions and diversified quickly over 10 million years.
Introduction Therapsida is a clade of diverse and ecologically successful tetrapods, with mammals as their modern representatives1. The roots of the clade extend back to the late Palaeozoic, when non-mammalian therapsids were important components of terrestrial ecosystems. Until now, the oldest known unequivocal therapsid was Raranimus dashankouensis, from probable Roadian (lower middle Permian) deposits of central-east Asia2. Yet, phylogenetic analyses consistently suggest that therapsids are the sister group of sphenacodontid ‘pelycosaur’-grade synapsids, which originated in the…
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