Kombuisia

Kombuisia
Temporal range: Early to Middle Triassic
Kombuisia frerensis
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Clade: Synapsida
Clade: Therapsida
Suborder: †Anomodontia
Clade: †Dicynodontia
Family: †Kingoriidae
Genus: †Kombuisia
Hotton, 1974
Species
  • †K. frerensis Hotton, 1974 (type)
  • †K. antarctica Fröbisch et al., 2010

Kombuisia is a genus of dicynodont from Early to Middle Triassic (Induan to Anisian) of South Africa and Antarctica. Two species were described for the genus: Kombuisia frerensis (type)[1] and Kombuisia antarctica.[2]

Dicynodonts were a diverse clade that inhabited the earth from the Middle Permian to the Late Triassic. Kombuisia is one of few species to survive the mass extinction event in the late Permian.[3][2] Kombuisia are non-mammalian synapsid herbivores.[4] Specimens of this genus were discovered in the 1960s and 1970s and years later were determined to be two different species of the genus.

The two species were found in diverse areas, K. frerensis in South Africa and K. antarctica in Antarctica. This indicated that this genus existed in a wider biographical region in the southern hemisphere of Pangaea[2] and believed by some to indicate the migration to Antarctica to avoid the rise in global temperatures that lead to the mass extinction.[3] Migration to avoid global warming has been highly controversial because many of the fossils that are found in this region are juvenile and of small body size. But so far no Permian vertebrate fossils are known from Antarctica, making it less likely that they were already living there prior to the event.[5]

Originally the specimens that were collected in Antarctica were considered to be part of the Kingoria (now known as Dicynodontoides) genus. The specimens were originally catalogued in the American Museum of Natural History as Kingoria, however, with no formal reasoning for this categorization, this has since been revised with more up-to-date knowledge of features and speciation.

Kingoria was defined early on as a close relative to Kombuisia and Hotton describes the two groups as sister taxa. Kingoria and K. frerensis were relatively close geographically during their time of existence.[2][4] Kingoria fossils are found in the mid to southern region of Africa. In a re-evaluation of the cranial anatomy of K. frerensis using the rule of parsimony the most recent conclusion is that Kingoria and Kombuisia are sister taxa of the Kingoriidae clade.

  1. ^ Hotton, N. (1974). "A new dicynodont (Reptilia, Therapsida) from Cynognathus Assemblage Zone deposits of South Africa". Annals of the South African Museum. 64: 157–165.
  2. ^ a b c d Jörg Fröbisch, Kenneth D. Angielczyk and Christian A. Sidor (2010). "The Triassic dicynodont Kombuisia (Synapsida, Anomodontia) from Antarctica, a refuge from the terrestrial Permian-Triassic mass extinction". Naturwissenschaften. 97 (2): 187–196. Bibcode:2010NW.....97..187F. doi:10.1007/s00114-009-0626-6. PMID 19956920. S2CID 20557454.
  3. ^ a b "Animals fled to Antarctic to survive global warming". Telegraph.co.uk. The Telegraph. 3 December 2009. Retrieved 28 February 2017.
  4. ^ a b Angielczyk, Kenneth (2009). "Taxonomic revision and new observations on the postcranial skeleton, biogeography, and biostratigraphy of the Dicynodont genus Dicynodontoides, the senior subjective synonym of Kingoria Therapsida, Anomodontia". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 29 (4): 1174–1187. Bibcode:2009JVPal..29.1174A. doi:10.1671/039.029.0427. S2CID 85787287.
  5. ^ Shanta Barley (2009-12-03). "Antarctica was climate refuge during great extinction". New Scientist.