Pachycormiformes

Pachycormiformes
Temporal range: Early Jurassic - Late Cretaceous, Toarcian–Maastrichtian
Skeleton of Pachycormus
Skeleton of Orthocormus
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Actinopterygii
Infraclass: Teleosteomorpha
Division: Aspidorhynchei
Order: Pachycormiformes
Berg 1937
Family: Pachycormidae
Woodward, 1895
Type genus
Pachycormus
Agassiz, 1833
Genera

See text

Synonyms[1]
  • Diphyodontidae Jordan, 1923
  • Erisichtheidae Cope, 1877b
  • Microlepidoti Zittel, 1887
  • Pelecopteridae Cope, 1875
  • Protosphyraenidae Lydekker, 1889
  • Sauropsidae Cope, 1877a
  • Saurotomini [Saurostomini] Bonaparte, 1846 corrig. Bonaparte 1850a

Pachycormiformes is an extinct order of marine ray-finned fish known from the Early Jurassic to the end of the Cretaceous. It only includes a single family, Pachycormidae. They were characterized by having serrated pectoral fins (though more recent studies demonstrated that fin shape diversity in this group was high[2]), reduced pelvic fins and a bony rostrum. Pachycormiformes are morphologically diverse, containing both tuna and swordfish-like carnivorous forms, as well as edentulous suspension-feeding forms.

  1. ^ van der Laan, R. (2018). "Family-group names of fossil fishes". European Journal of Taxonomy (466). doi:10.5852/ejt.2018.466.
  2. ^ Liston, Jeff J.; Maltese, Anthony E.; Lambers, Paul H.; Delsate, Dominique; Harcourt-Smith, William E. H.; Heteren, Anneke H. van (2019-11-07). "Scythes, sickles and other blades: defining the diversity of pectoral fin morphotypes in Pachycormiformes". PeerJ. 7: e7675. doi:10.7717/peerj.7675. ISSN 2167-8359. PMC 6842561. PMID 31720097.