Acrolepis

Acrolepis
Temporal range: Famennian to Early Triassic[1][2]
Fossil of Acrolepis sedgwicki
Restoration
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Actinopterygii
Order: †Elonichthyiformes
Family: †Acrolepididae
Genus: †Acrolepis
Agassiz, 1833
Type species
†Acrolepis sedgwicki
Agassiz, 1833
Other species

See text

Acrolepis (Ancient Greek for "tip scale") is an extinct genus of prehistoric marine bony fish that lived from the Famennian stage of the Devonian to the early Triassic epoch.[1][3] Some species from the Early Triassic of Tasmania are also ascribed to Acrolepis.[2]

It is a large piscivorous predatory fish in the acrolepid family, which occupied an apex predator niche in its locale. A. gigas was estimated to have grown up to 1.25 metres (4.1 ft) in length.[4]

A close relationship between the mostly Palaeozoic Acrolepidae and the Mesozoic Ptycholepiformes was proposed, but support from phylogenetic analyses is scarce.[5] More recent studies place it in the order Elonichthyiformes.[6][7]

  1. ^ a b Sepkoski, Jack (2002). "A compendium of fossil marine animal genera". Bulletins of American Paleontology. 363: 1–560. Archived from the original on 2011-07-23. Retrieved 2009-04-24.
  2. ^ a b Romano, Carlo; Koot, Martha B.; Kogan, Ilja; Brayard, Arnaud; Minikh, Alla V.; Brinkmann, Winand; Bucher, Hugo; Kriwet, Jürgen (February 2016). "Permian-Triassic Osteichthyes (bony fishes): diversity dynamics and body size evolution". Biological Reviews. 91 (1): 106–147. doi:10.1111/brv.12161. PMID 25431138. S2CID 5332637.
  3. ^ "PBDB". paleobiodb.org. Retrieved 2024-03-10.
  4. ^ Štamberg, Stanislav (2006). "Carboniferous-Permian actinopterygian fishes of the continental basins of the Bohemian Massif, Czech Republic: an overview". Geological Society, London, Special Publications. 265 (1): 217–230. Bibcode:2006GSLSP.265..217S. doi:10.1144/gsl.sp.2006.265.01.10. ISSN 0305-8719. S2CID 129300756.
  5. ^ Mutter, Raoul (2011). "A case study of the palaeobiogeography of Early Mesozoic actinopterygians, the family Ptycholepidae.". In Upchurch, P.; McGowan, A.J.; Slater, C.S.C. (eds.). Palaeogeography and Palaeobiogeography: Biodiversity in Space and Time. CRC Press, Boca Raton. pp. 143–171.
  6. ^ "PBDB". paleobiodb.org. Retrieved 2024-01-29.
  7. ^ Bakaev, Aleksandr S.; Kogan, Ilja; Yankevich, Dmitri (2020-06-22). "On the validity of names of some Permian actinopterygians from European Russia". Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie - Abhandlungen. 296 (3): 305–316. doi:10.1127/njgpa/2020/0907. ISSN 0077-7749.