ABSTRACT Thalattosuchians, an extinct lineage of Mesozoic crocodylomorphs, underwent a remarkable evolutionary transition from primarily semi-aquatic teleosaurids, through increasingly ocean-adapted metriorhynchoids, to the fully pelagic metriorhynchids. Understanding how such a major habitat shift affected their sensory systems provides valuable perspective on vertebrate adaptations. Here, we present a comparative analysis integrating digital endocranial reconstructions from computed tomography (CT) scans of 22 skulls of crocodylomorph species, including extant crocodylians and a diverse range of thalattosuchians. Focusing on somatosensation and vision, we seek to gain new insights into sensory evolution in the group using statistical comparative methods. Our findings reveal that thalattosuchians, especially pelagic metriorhynchids, evolved significantly smaller trigeminal ganglia relative to skull size than non-marine crocodylomorphs, suggesting reduced investment in facial mechanoreception. Interestingly, visual structures (orbit and optic nerve canal dimensions) scale proportionally with skull size across thalattosuchians, reflecting proportional scaling rather than enlargement. This pattern suggests that metriorhynchids maintained visual reliance and any functional enhancement was likely achieved through optical or neural optimisation rather than cranial modification. These findings challenge assumptions of uniform sensory trade-off during aquatic transitions and highlight the importance of lineage-specific constraints in shaping evolutionary trajectories.

ABSTRACT Dental microwear texture analysis (DMTA) has been widely used to study the dietary habits and trends of animals, based on the abrasion patterns preserved in dental enamel. Therefore, it is an important tool to understand the ecology, niche partitioning, and competition between co-occurring extant and extinct taxa. Late Jurassic sauropod dinosaur faunas were quite diverse, with distinct groups inhabiting the same ecosystems. Being the largest mega-herbivores of their ecosystems, competition for resources could have been a determining factor behind such diversity, making sauropods a good study-group for DMTA. Here, we describe the complete process of creating a large DMTA dataset of 119 teeth attributed to most major Late Jurassic sauropod groups. We describe in detail the production of dental moulds, casts, and the steps taken throughout the measuring process of the three-dimensional surface textures. We also describe the way in which we tested the quality of our data, as well as the taphonomical implications for future studies using the resulting dataset. Our tests confirm the lack of a taphonomic impact on the acquired data and the comparability of measurements obtained from both moulds and original teeth. The result is the first large DMTA sauropod teeth dataset, consisting of 971 measurements.

ABSTRACT Makwal is a Pleistocene site located in Kharian, Gujrat, Punjab, Pakistan. The site has produced abundant Pleistocene (Pinjor Formation) faunal assemblages. In Pakistan, only a few Pleistocene sites have yielded rhinoceros remains. The new material includes conjoined partial mandibles with right p2–m3 and left p2–p4 collected from Makwal. It shows a high morphological similarity with the previously described material of rhinoceros, Rhinoceros palaeindicus and Rhinoceros sivalensis from the Indian subcontinent. In the large the teeth, it resembles more with R. palaeindicus. The Pinjor Formation Rhinoceros fossils are revisited and their taxonomic status is reviewed. The synonymy of several species of the genus Rhinoceros previously proposed for the Siwalik Pleistocene is discussed, and the synonymy between R. sivalensis and R. palaeindicus is considered validhence, the described material is attributed to R. sivalensis.

ABSTRACT A new species of the enigmatic carnivorous mammal Simidectes Stock, 1933, S. coombsae, is described from a dentary with well-preserved p4–m3 from the lower tongue of the Friars Formation (early Uintan) of San Diego County, California. The form is the oldest and smallest named species of the genus. While it shares features with other species of Simidectes, including relatively low trigonids with subequal protoconid and metaconid, narrow talonid and molars decreasing in size distally, S. coombsae has some distinctive features, including a relatively small, simple p5, a short but salient paraconid on m1 and molar talonids closed by a distolingual crest incorporating the entoconid. Similar molar features are present on an isolated tooth from the late Bridgerian of Wyoming, supporting a previous tentative assignment to Simidectes. The morphology of the new species is most similar to that of members of Hyaenodonta and Carnivoraformes. If the morphology of S. coombsae is plesiomorphic for Simidectes, it indicates that some of the similarities shared by other species of the genus with Pantolesta represent convergence. https://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:09778F5B-92F3-43BA-A371-AA624573FFA5

ABSTRACT Coprolites containing food residues aid in reconstructing the feeding habits of their producers and determining their positions within food webs. The present study examines millimetre-sized coprolites from the Early Ordovician Liexi fauna in South China. These coprolites are preserved in three dimensions and exhibit considerable morphological diversity, which can be broadly categorised into three types: the first type is approximately sinusoidal or irregularly rope-shaped, often exhibiting transverse shallow grooves that do not extend across the entire specimen; the second type shows pronounced sinuosity, with narrow and deep creases; and the third type is elongated, bearing oblique and nearly parallel shallow grooves that extend to the margins. The coprolites are composed primarily of calcium phosphate and contain sparse arthropod residues along with some unidentified inclusions. Based on the consideration of morphology features, composition and inclusions of the coprolites, as well as the composition of the Liexi fauna and that of contemporaneous strata, the producers were likely jawless vertebrates (i.e. conodonts), although the possibility of errant plumulitids or worms cannot be excluded.

ABSTRACT Cases of dental abnormalities in the late Early Pleistocene meridionaloid elephant Archidiskodon meridionalis tamanensis Dubrovo, 1964 from the Sinyaya Balka/Bogatyri locality (Taman Peninsula, Krasnodar Territory, Russia) are described for the first time. A total of 231 samples were examined, of which 31 were premolars and 200 were molars. Approximately 8% (totalling 18 specimens) of the dental specimens exhibited signs of abnormality. The most frequent dental abnormality cases were related to atypical wear of the occlusal surface and disorders in the typical dental progression in the jaw, without clear evidence of pathology. Some specimens have curved chewing surfaces formed during the process of functioning. Molars express uneven erasure of the enamel when the plates are strongly erased on one side and much weaker on the other. In several molars, plate displacement at the posterior end was observed, resembling patterns seen in woolly mammoths. The study also documents two notable cases of supernumerary (additional) teeth.

ABSTRACT Groveriella oisensis sp. nov. first fossil representative of this extant genus is described from the Lowermost Eocene Oise amber (Northern France). It currently represents the oldest record of the tribe Strobliellini. Groveriella Mamaev, 1978, is currently known by only two extant North and East European species living under much colder climates than the warm tropical paleoclimate of the Oise amber. https://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:F85432CB-D4DF-4522-B7B5-1E19F71D59A4

ABSTRACT Kobdocoridae is an extinct family within the infraorder Pentatomomorpha (Heteroptera, Hemiptera), currently comprising only 10 species from 8 genera. Here, we describe a new species Miracorizus parallelinervius Yang, Yao & Ren sp. nov. The new species based on a unique dark spot at the base of the forewing membrane and a highly developed bell-shaped ovipositor closely resembles the characteristics of Miracorizus punctatus (Yao, Cai & Ren, 2006) comb. nov. which as a genus of Rhopalidae. However, the bell-shaped ovipositor is a typical character of Kobdocoridae. Through comparisons with the holotype and fossil representatives of Rhopalidae and Kobdocoridae from the same locality, we transferred Miracorizus from Rhopalidae to Kobdocoridae and revised its diagnosis. LSID:https://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:FE906594-B5C6-47F4-921F-18E6D3C0E550

ABSTRACT Ninety-two localities from the Daroca-Calamocha area (central Spain), spanning seven million years, have yielded a high diversity of Miocene erinaceids, comprising six species of Galericinae (Galerix remmerti, Galerix symeonidisi, Galerix exilis, Parasorex sp. Parasorex voesendorfensis, Lantanotherium sp.) and four species of Erinaceinae (‘Amphechinus’ baudeloti, Atelerix cf. depereti, ‘Mioechinus’ sp. Erinaceinae gen. et sp. indet). We identify the transition from Galerix remmerti to G. exilis during Local Zone C (MN4) and discuss the differences between G. exilis and G. symeonidisi in Spain. Detailed comparisons of the intraspecific variability of Galerix species lead to a new phylogeny of the genus that supports a strong basal dichotomy and two distinct dispersal events into Europe during the Early Miocene. The record of Parasorex sp. and Lantanotherium sp. in the Iberian Peninsula is constrained to the middle-late Aragonian transition and is correlated with unstable climatic conditions. The latest Aragonian and Vallesian material from Nombrevilla 2, Carrilanga 1, and Pedregueras 2A, previously identified as Parasorex socialis, is reattributed to Parasorex voesendorfensis.