Varanidae

Varanids
Temporal range:
Late Cretaceous – Holocene, 80–0 Ma
Male Komodo dragons (Varanus komodoensis) fighting, Indonesia
Fossil of Saniwa, an extinct varanid known from the Eocene of North America
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Reptilia
Order: Squamata
Superfamily: Varanoidea
Family: Varanidae
Merrem, 1820
Genera

The Varanidae are a family of lizards in the superfamily Varanoidea and order Anguimorpha. The family, a group of carnivorous and frugivorous lizards,[1] includes the living genus Varanus and a number of extinct genera more closely related to Varanus than to the earless monitor lizard (Lanthanotus).[2] Varanus includes the Komodo dragon (the largest living lizard), crocodile monitor, savannah monitor, the goannas of Australia and Southeast Asia, and various other species with a similarly distinctive appearance. Their closest living relatives are the earless monitor lizard and Chinese crocodile lizard.[3] The oldest members of the family are known from the Late Cretaceous of Mongolia.[2]

  1. ^ Welton LJ, Siler CD, Bennett D, Diesmos A, Duya MR, Dugay R, et al. (October 2010). "A spectacular new Philippine monitor lizard reveals a hidden biogeographic boundary and a novel flagship species for conservation". Biology Letters. 6 (5): 654–658. doi:10.1098/rsbl.2010.0119. PMC 2936141. PMID 20375042.
  2. ^ a b Dong L, Wang YQ, Zhao Q, Vasilyan D, Wang Y, Evans SE (March 2022). "A new stem-varanid lizard (Reptilia, Squamata) from the early Eocene of China". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological Sciences. 377 (1847): 20210041. doi:10.1098/rstb.2021.0041. PMC 8819366. PMID 35125002.
  3. ^ Fry BG, Vidal N, Norman JA, Vonk FJ, Scheib H, Ramjan SF, et al. (February 2006). "Early evolution of the venom system in lizards and snakes". Nature. 439 (7076): 584–588. Bibcode:2006Natur.439..584F. doi:10.1038/nature04328. PMID 16292255. S2CID 4386245.