Phacops rana

Phacops rana ("Eldredgeops rana") is a species of trilobite from the middle Devonian period. Their fossils are found chiefly in the northeastern United States, southwestern Ontario, and in Morocco.
Description.
"Phacops rana" can be recognized by its large eyes (which remind some observers of a frog's eyes—the specific name "rana" is a reference to a common frog), its fairly large size (up to 6 inches long), and its habit of rolling up into a ball like a pill bug ("volvation"). In order to protect themselves from predators, "Phacops rana" would roll into a ball with its hard exoskeleton on the outside as protection. Many other trilobites possessed the same ability, but "Phacops rana" nearly perfected it. The slightest amount of sediment would trigger their senses, and "Phacops rana" would be hidden in a tiny shelter made of its own body. Although this safety feature often helped them to evade predators, occasionally it backfired and the trilobite would be buried under heavy sediment. Their fossils can still be found in balled-up positions 400 million years later.
Fossilisation.
"Phacops rana" is found both in the northeastern U.S. and in Morocco; North America was attached to the African plate during the Devonian.
Because of its abundance and popularity with collectors, "Phacops rana" was designated the Pennsylvania state fossil by the state's General Assembly on December 5, 1988.
Phacopid eyes.
The most striking feature of the morphology of "Phacops rana" and its relatives is their eyes. These differed from the eyes of most trilobites in having comparatively few lenses spaced between deep sclera. The lenses themselves were very rounded instead of largely flat. The eyes were mounted on turret-like structures which could swivel, providing the animal with an almost 360-degree field of view. This type of eye is known as the schizochroal eye.


Gyrometopus

Gyrometopus is an extinct genus from a well-known class of fossil marine arthropods, the trilobites. It lived during the Arenig stage of the Ordovician Period, approximately 479 to 472 million years ago.
Description.
The central raised area (or glabella) is flattened and its front is slightly expanded. There are 3 pairs of faint and narrow furrows that define lateral lobes. The lip (or rostral plate), the part of the doublure on the midline, is semicircular and the left and right sutures connect before reaching the inner margin of doublure. The articulate midlength part of the exoskeleton (or thorax) has 11 segments, which are divided by narrow pleural furrows. The margin of the tailshield (or pygidium) is entire, and the frontal two segments are well-defined by narrow pleural and interpleural furrows.
Distribution.
"Gyrometopus lineatus", is found in the Lower Ordovician (Floian) of Sweden (Stora Stola, Timmerdala, Västergötland).
Relations with other Phacopina.
"Gyrometopus" is probably close to the common ancestor of the Phacopina. "Gyrometopus" is phacopid in appearance, but unlike in other Phacopina, a rostral plate is present, although it does not reach the inside of the cephalic doublure, as is customary in non-Phacopine trilobites.


Dahlemer Binz Airfield

Dahlemer Binz Airfield () is a public general aviation airfield in the Eifel mountains of Germany. It is located in the municipality of Dahlem, about 35 kilometres southwest of Euskirchen.
The airfield is licensed for:


Sinoe oil field

The Sinoe oil field is an oil field located on the continental shelf of the Black Sea. It was discovered in 1991 and developed by Petrom. It began production in 1999 and produces oil. The total proven reserves of the Sinoe oil field are around , and production is centered on . The field also produces around per day of gas and has reserves of .


Cuspilongus

Cuspilongus is an extinct genus of parasitic wasp in the sawfly family Cephidae. At the time of its description the new genus comprised a single species named Cuspilongus cachecreekensis, known from an Eocene fossil found in North America. Subsequently, Kopylov & Rasnitsyn (2016) transferred the Early Cretaceous (Aptian) species "Mesocephus ghilarovi" Rasnitsyn (1988), known from the Bon-Tsagan locality in Mongolia, to the genus "Cuspilongus" as well.
History and classification.
"C. cachecreekensis" is known only from one fossil, a part and counterpart holotype, specimen number F-1545 & F-1546, which is housed in the collections of the Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops, British Columbia. "Cuspilongus" was described from a specimen which was recovered from outcrops of the early Eocene, Ypresian McAbee Fossil Beds near Cache Creek, British Columbia. The unnamed formation outcropping at the McAbee Fossil Beds preserve an upland temperate flora that was first interpreted as being Microthermal, although further study has shown them to be more mesothermal in nature. The plant community preserved in the McAbee Fossil Beds site is mostly broadleaf pollen with alder and elm dominating, and may represent a successional forest involving multiple volcanic ash eruptions.
"C. cachecreekensis" was first studied by the paleoentomologists S. Bruce Archibald from Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia and Alexandr Rasnitsyn of the A. A. Borissiak Paleontological Institute. Their 2015 type description of the new genus and species was published in the journal "Canadian Entomologist". The genus name "Cuspilongus" was coined by the researchers as a combination of the Latin words "cuspis" which means "lance" and "longus" meaning long, in reference to the notable length of the holotype's ovipositor. The specific epithet "cachecreekensis" is in honor of the town of Cache Creek, British Columbia, west of the type locality.
"Cuspilongus cachecreekensis" was one of three sawfly species described in Archibald & Rasnitsyn's 2015 paper, the other two being "Ulteramus republicensis" and "Ypresiosirex orthosemos", from the Klondike Mountain Formation and the McAbee fossil beds respectively.
Description.
The single described female of "C. cachecreekensis" is mostly complete, missing the legs entirely, with the antennae preserved in disarticulated segments, and portions of the abdomen are obscured. The female has a body length of approximately and an overall preserved length of with the ovipositor included. The head and thorax are dark in coloration, while the abdomen is light colored in the preserved and visible areas. Similarly the wings are lightly colored to hyaline, with the exception of the intercostal space, which is notably darkened. The abdomen is damaged but the ovipositor is preserved well, being about long with part of the sheath preserved, with both the ovipositor and sheath showing a downward curve. The genus is distinct from other members of the family in the length of the ovipositor, which is similar to the length of the forewing. Living members of the family have ovipositors that are only up to half the length of the forewing.


Peregrino

Peregrino is an oil field (block BM-C-7) located offshore of Brazil, east of Rio de Janeiro, in the southwest part of the Campos Basin area with about of oil in place within the sanctioned area. The oil field was discovered in 2004 and was formerly known as Chinook.
Reserves and production.
The location is off the coast, situated in of water. Peregrino is a heavy crude oil of 13. API and with high viscosity. Sulfur content is 1.8% which is considered medium sour. The estimated recoverable volume of crude oil is to . The first oil is expected for early 2011, where 5 wells are anticipated for production and production should reach a plateau of within the first year with a targeted production of some by 2012. The field will be completed in three phases and will include approximately 60 wells; phase one of the project includes 37 wells; 30 production wells and 7 water injection wells. The temperature of the oil, gas, water and sand from the field is 79.6°C in the reservoir and 60-66°C on arrival in the ship, and then heated to 130-150°C for processing (separation). After this, the temperature is kept at 65-70°C to keep the oil liquid.
Development.
The field was originally planned to be operated by Anadarko Petroleum with Statoil as 50%; however, on March 4, 2008, Statoil purchased Anadarko's 50% share of the oil field for US$1.8 billion. At the time of acquiring the license, the field's recovery factor was estimated to be 9%. However, with the current reservoir depletion plan of the field calling for the use of produced water injection and rock compaction, Peregrino's recovery factor has increased to 20%. On 21 May 2010, Statoil agreed to sell 40% stake to Sinochem.
The first phase of the development includes two drilling and wellhead platforms and a ship-shaped floating production, storage and off-take unit (FPSO) called Maersk Peregrino built in Singapore. It is 345m long, cost 1B euros and is powered by 72 MW steam turbines fueled by gas from the field.
The platforms are tied back to the FPSO by flowlines and power umbilicals. Project requires extensive sub-surface and reservoir management skills such as produced water injection, horizontal wells and flow assurance to sustain the project over a longer-term.
With the current reservoir depletion plan of the field calling for the use of produced water injection and rock compaction, Peregrino's recovery factor has increased to 20%.
Contractors.
The project commenced in February 2007, when South Atlantic Holding and Maersk Contractors signed an agreement to perform a FEED study for the project. Shortly after the FEED, a contract was awarded to Maersk Contractors (now Maersk FPSOs) for the provision of the FPSO and for 15 years of operation of the FPSO.
Aker Solutions will perform the mooring installation work – the first marine installation job for Aker Solutions in Brazil. The scope of work comprises planning and installation of a submerged turret production (STP) buoy with mooring system using ten mooring lines with 90-tonne piles, heavy chain and wire. The operations were scheduled to be conducted during Q4 2009.
APL (a subsidiary of National Oilwell Varco) will provide the submerged turret production and mooring system for the Peregrino FPSO.
Kiewit Offshore Services was selected for the engineering, procurement, and construction of the two large 6,500-ton decks and two jackets, 6,600 and 7,000 tons respectfully. Additional scope also includes the fabrication of two piles weighing a total of 5,600 tons.
Subsea 7 received a contract for the engineering, procurement, construction and installation of the pipelines connecting the two platforms to the FPSO. Another contract was awarded to Kiewit Offshore Services Ltd. for the supply of two drilling platforms for the field.
FMC Technologies will manufacture and install the surface wellheads and surface production trees for the Peregrino project.
Wood Group Brasil was selected by Statoil to provide operations, maintenance and modification services for the two Peregrino wellhead platforms. The five-year contract is valued at approximately US $60 million. Wood Group Brasil's project scope includes both offshore services and onshore support, and covers all production processes and equipment except drilling services. The project will be managed by Wood Group Brasil's existing management team, and more than 50 local workers will be hired for operations, maintenance, engineering and other positions.
William Jacob Management, Inc. were awarded the engineering, procurement and construction management by Statoil for the provision of the drilling facilities.
Siem Consub will provide maritime support for the initial 2 years under a renewable contract for an additional year. The PSV-ship will be available beginning in the first quarter of 2010. Seawell, a Seadrill subsidiary, will manage the drilling campaign at a cost of US$90 million.


Sierra de Los Cucapah

Sierra de Los Cucapah is a mountain range in Baja California state, Northwestern Mexico. It is located south of Mexicali. The range is named after the Cocopah who arrived in the area around 700 b.c and still live in the area.
The Sierra de los Cucapah are north-south trending mountains of the Peninsular Ranges between the Laguna Salada basin to the west and the Cerro Prieto Volcano and Cerro Prieto Geothermal Power Station to the east.
The geothermal field is south of Mexicali.
Location.
The location in relation to Mexicali is discernable in the aerial photograph at right, as the Sierra is visible in the lower left.


Radstockiceras

Radstockiceras is an extinct genus of lower Jurassic ammonite that lived from Oxynotum zone of upper Sinemurian to Raricostatum zone of lower Pliensbachian. Shells of these animals were oxycone and involute with umbilicus that took maximum of 12% of diameter in the case of outer whorls. On inner whorls, venter has been sharp, but then it became rounded. Faint ribs had falcoid shape, but sometimes, ribs could absent. Shells could have been large in their size. Suture has been very complex, similar to "Oxynoticeras", but culmination at umbilical margin has been missing. Genus has been named after town of Radstock, in Somerset.
Distribution.
Fossils belonging to this genus are found in Europe, South America, North Africa and Turkey.


Geology of the Waikato-King Country Region

The Waikato and King Country regions of New Zealand are built upon a basement of greywacke rocks, which form many of the hills. Much of the land to the west of the Waikato River and in the King Country to the south has been covered by limestone and sandstone, forming bluffs and a karst landscape. The volcanic cones of Karioi and Pirongia dominate the landscape near Raglan and Kawhia Harbours. To the east, the land has been covered with ignimbrite deposits from the Taupo Volcanic Zone. Large amounts of pumice from the Taupo Volcanic Zone have been deposited in the Waikato Basin and Hauraki Plains.
Basement rocks.
As with most of New Zealand, the basement rocks of the Waikato Region and King Country are composed of greywacke (indurated sandstone, siltstone and mudstone).
The Waipa Fault passes north–south through the Waikato-King Country region, from Taupiri, along the Waipa River, and south to near Ohura. It represents a major dividing line between different terranes.
Murihiku Terrane greywacke lies beneath the Waikato-King Country region on the western side, and outcrops to the west of the Waipa Fault, from south of Waikato Heads to Awakino. The Murihiku Terrane is considered to be an accretionary wedge of mainly volcanogenic forearc sediments. It was formed in Late Triassic to Late Jurassic times (220-145 Ma).
A line of Dun Mountain-Maitai Terrane rocks are assumed to pass north–south along the Waipa Fault, through the centre of the Waikato-King Country region, separating the Murihiku Terrane and Waipapa Composite Terrane, and produce a detectable Junction Magnetic Anomaly, but only outcrops at one place, at Wairere. Some Murihiku rocks occur to the east of the Junction Magnetic Anomaly, forming the Taupiri and Hakarimata Ranges, but it is assumed that these rocks have been shifted to their present position.
The Waipapa Morrinsville Terrane greywacke lies beneath the Waikato-King Country region on the eastern side, south of the Hunua Ranges, and east of the Waipa Fault. It was formed in Late Jurassic to Early Cretaceous times (160-120 Ma).
Te Kuiti Group coal and limestone.
The Te Kuiti Group rocks overlie the basement rocks, and are present in Northland, Auckland, the Waikato, and King Country, although they have often been eroded or covered. Rocks containing coal were formed from swampland in Late Eocene times (37-34 Ma). The land sunk and the sea transgressed, and calcareous sandstone, mudstone, and limestone were deposited in Oligocene times (34-24 Ma).
The coal deposits outcrop near Huntly and Maramarua, where they are mined.
Limestone exists in the area south and west of the Waikato River, down to Piopio and Te Kuiti, producing impressive bluffs around Port Waikato, Raglan Harbour, Kawhia Harbour, Otorohanga, Waitomo, Te Kuiti, etc. The Karst landscape around Waitomo contains many cave systems, including the Waitomo Glowworm Cave.
Miocene sediment.
In early Miocene times (24 Ma), plate convergence caused regional compression. The land eroded, and was deposited throughout the Miocene (24-5 Ma) in rapidly subsiding basins. These soft sandstones and mudstones remain to the southwest of Te Kuiti.
Mohakatino Volcanic Arc.
The volcanic arc that developed to the west of Northland and Auckland extended further south towards Taranaki. These andesitic and basaltic volcanoes were mostly active in middle Miocene times (14-11 Ma), and contributed to the sandstone and mudstone deposits that formed around that time.
Recent volcanic activity.
Mount Karioi and Mount Pirongia, near Raglan and Kawhia Harbours, are large stratovolcanoes composed of andesite and basalt, that erupted about 2.5 Ma ago. Other volcanoes in this group include Kakepuku, Te Kawa, and Tokanui.
Maungatautari, west of Te Awamutu, is a volcano, composed of andesite and dacite, that erupted about 1.8 Ma.
Ignimbrite and pumice deposits.
Over the last 2 million years, pyroclastic flows from the Taupo Volcanic Zone have deposited ignimbrites over the area East of Te Kuiti. Some of the largest deposits are from the Whakamaru eruption, north of Taupo, around 330,000 years ago. The ignimbrite deposits from the Oruanui eruption 26,500 years ago, and the Taupo eruption, 1800 years ago are also major deposits. They form impressive cliffs in many areas.
The Hauraki Plains and Hauraki Gulf are believed to represent a rift valley. The rift valley is assumed to have developed about 2 Ma ago, due to the clockwise rotation of the Eastern North Island, that stretched the land between Auckland and East Cape. The Waikato River used to flow from Lake Karapiro, through the Hinuera Gap, and Hauraki Plains, to come out on the east coast in the Hauraki Gulf. The sediment from the 26.5 ka Oruanui eruption of Lake Taupo caused the river to change direction, and come out to the west. In fact, the Waikato River changes its route quite regularly, as eruptions occur in the Taupo Volcanic Zone, and the river channel becomes blocked. Many lakes and swamps in the Waikato Basin represent old routes.
Pumice from the Taupo Volcanic Zone has been deposited throughout the Waipa and Waikato Basins, and the Hauraki Plains, forming excellent soils and swampland.
Tauranga Group.
Tauranga Group describes sediments of the last 5 million years, mainly of volcanic pumice, initially Pliocene deposits (Walton Subgroup) from Coromandel and latterly Holocene from Taupo (Piako Subgroup). They underlie the Hamilton lowlands and extend into the Waipa basin, but elsewhere are mainly alluvial deposits in valleys. As well as pumice gravels and sands, they include silts, muds and peat.
Coastal dunes.
Substantial sand dunes with high iron content have formed around the Kawhia and Aotea Harbours.
David Kear's 'Geology of Ironsand Resources of New Zealand' (NZ Dept of Scientific & Industrial Research 1979) says, "The ironsand deposits extend from south Kaipara and Muriwai, north of Auckland, for over 300 miles southwards to the Whangaehu River, south of Wanganui". Soluble iron in concentrates exceeds 50% in most locations. It is currently mined at Taharoa and Waikato North Head.
Maps.
Geological maps of New Zealand can be obtained from the New Zealand Institute of Geological and Nuclear Science (GNS Science), a New Zealand Government Research Institute.
GNS provides a free Map of New Zealand's Geological Foundations.
The main maps are the 1 : 250 000 QMap series, which will be completed as a series of 21 maps and booklets in 2010. Low resolution versions of these maps (without the associated booklet) can be downloaded from the GNS site for free. The map for the Waikato Area was published in 2005.


Homoeosaurus

Homoeosaurus is an extinct genus of sphenodont reptile. It was found in limestone in Bavaria, Germany, as well as in France and the United Kingdom. It was related to the modern tuatara, though it was a considerably more gracile. There were several species varying greatly in size and morphology.


Musgravetown Group

The Musgravetown Group is a terminal Ediacaran stratigraphic group of terrestrialish sandstones, lavas and tuffs cropping out in Newfoundland.
It corresponds temporally to the Signal Hill Group further east.


Else Marie Friis

Else Marie Friis (born 18 June 1947) is a Danish botanist and paleontologist. She is Professor Emerita in the Department of Geoscience at Aarhus University. Her work has been fundamental in the phylogenetic analysis of angiosperms, with widespread application to reproductive biology.
Education and early life.
The daughter of a bookseller Poul Friis and Marie Møller, she was born in Holstebro, and grew up in Skive, graduating from local school Viborg Katedralskole in 1966. She worked as an au-pair in Paris for a year, becoming interested in geology whilst her brother Henrik was a student in the subject. This inspired her to become an assistant teacher in botany and geology in 1971.
In 1975 she earned a Magister's degree in science and in 1980 a Licentiate's degree in science, both from Aarhus University.
Research and career.
Her area of interest is the reproductive biology, phylogeny and palaeoecology of flowering plants based on plant reproductive organs from the Cretaceous period.
Early on in her career she began research into lignite, being involved in fieldwork in the lignite mines in Central Jutland from 1968-1972. She was interested in the ecology and climate of Denmark in the middle Miocene, writing her Licentiate thesis on the subject.
From 1980-1981 she moved to London as a British Council Research Scholar, switching research interests following the co-discovery with Swedish scientist Annie Skarby of rare fossilised flowers from the Cretaceous period.
She returned to Aarhus University in 1981, co-publishing a book "The Origins of Angiosperms and Their Biological Consequences" in 1987. She became the head of palaeobotany at the Swedish Museum of Natural History in Stockholm later that year.
In 1999 she was awarded an honorary doctorate from Uppsala University, and has been a visiting professor at Zurich University.
Awards and Associations.
Friis is a member of the:
and a
She has received the:
In addition, she was named Geologist of the year in 2005 by the Swedish Association of Scientists.


Hilarcotherium

Hilarcotherium is an extinct genus of astrapotheriid mammals that lived in South America during the Middle Miocene (Laventan). The type species is "H. castanedaii", found in sediments of the La Victoria Formation, part of the Honda Group in the department of Tolima in Colombia. In 2018, Carrillo "et al." described a partial skull and mandible of a second species "H. miyou" from the Castilletes Formation in the Cocinetas Basin of northern Colombia, and estimated the body weight of the animal at .
Discovery.
The remains of "Hilarcotherium castanedaii" were discovered by José Alfredo Castañeda, who found them in the Malnombre Creek in the Hilarco village located near the town of Purificación, in Tolima. This area, in the valley of the Upper Magdalena River, correspond to the La Victoria Formation, that along with the Villavieja Formation makes the Honda Group, dating from the Middle Miocene, made between 13-11.8 million years ago and it has provided a remarkable fossil site known as La Venta, although the lack of key fossils does not allow accurate establishment of the membership of the Hilarco site to the formation. The remains of "Hilarcotherium" were collected by dr. María Páramo and Gerardo Vargas, who took them to the Geological Museum José Royo y Gómez of Ingeominas (former name of Colombian Geological Service) in Bogotá for study and preservation. In February 2015 these remains were officially named, although the name "Hilarcotherium castanedaii" was released earlier and informally in conference abstracts. The genus name is derived from the Hilarco site and the term in Latinized Greek "therium", meaning "beast", while the species name "castanedaii" is in recognition to Castañeda, by finding and reporting the find.
A second species, "H. miyou" was described by Carrillo "et al". in 2018. The remains of "H. miyou" were discovered in Patajau, in the Castilletes Formation of La Guajira department, on northern Colombia. The deposits of Castilletes corresponds to the older SALMAs Santacrucian-Colloncuran, 16.7–14.2 million years ago during the early Middle Miocene. The remains the holotype, IGMp 881327, consists on a partial mandible with the left ramus, some of the molars and the canines, the left condylar process, a second upper molar (M2) and the distal portion of the femur. Also were referred to "H. miyou" the specimens MUN-STRI 34216, a fragmentary skull with portion of the occipitals, palatines, and left upper canine, an upper fourth premolar P4 and the second upper M2, and a fragmentary mandibular symphysis with the base of the lower canines and alveoli for left three incisives (i3, i2, and i1) and the right first incisives (i1 and i2); and MUN-STRI 38073, which consists in a left P4 and upper molar fragments. Also were discovered a series of postcranial remains, including humerus, radii, vertebrae, patella, sacrum, scapulae, femora and rib fragments. Since that these fossils were not associated with dental remains is not possible refer them to "H. miyou", but their large size and the fact that "Hilarcotherium" is the only astrapotherid taxon recognized in Castilletes allow classify them tentatively as "Hilarcotherium cf. miyou". The name of this species derived from the word "miyo’u" that means "large" in the Wayuunaiki language of the Wayuu people of La Guajira.
An additional discovery was made near to the wetlands of Zapatosa, in the municipality of Chimichagua in the Cesar department in northern Colombia. This specimen, a fragment of maxilar with a premolar (P4) and the first upper molar (M1) is catalogued as SGCMGJRG2018.V.7 and is housed in the Geological Museum Jose Royo y Gómez, which were donated by the discoverers of the specimen, Hasmet Florián and José Martínez. The site belongs to the Miocene but without a precise datation; the characteristics of the teeth support the assignation to "Hilarcotherium", but since that it shows some differences with the recognised species of the genus, is only classified as "Hilarcotherium" sp.
Description.
The holotype specimen of "Hilarcotherium castanedaii" is named IGM p881231. This consists of fragments of skull, a partial jaw, the vertebral ramus of a dorsal rib, a complete left humerus and an incisor tooth associated. The skull includes the rostrum area, the palate with the fourth premolar (P4) and the three upper molars (M1-M2-M3) plus part of the zygomatic arch and the braincase, but lacks the upper canines and the top portion of the skull. The premaxilla shows no sign of having teeth, as in other astrapotheres. The jaw missing the incisors, the crown of the fourth premolar and the left mandibular ramus, but has the roots of the teeth of the right side and a broken canine with an oval cross section. It has however the sockets for three incisors on each side of the jaw, which is a plesiomorphic feature, as his other relatives as "Xenastrapotherium" had two. In 2018, Carillo "et al." described a partial skull and mandibule of a second species "H. miyou" from the Castilletes Formation in the Cocinetas Basin of northern Colombia.
The humerus of "H. castanedaii" measures , with a head of at its widest and oriented backwards with a convex form. Moreover, as in "Astrapotherium", the bone thickness decreases as it approaches its lower (distal) end.
Analyses performed with his molars and humerus indicate that weight range of "H. castanedaii" would be between , which would be comparable to the modern black rhinoceros. Between astrapotheres, this size is equivalent to an "intermediate" range, since it is greater than that of genus as "Comahuetherium" () and "Astrapothericulus" (), and similar to "Xenastrapotherium" and "Astrapotherium? ruderarium", but lower than in the larger genera as "Astrapotherium" (), "Granastrapotherium" () and "Parastrapotherium" () This indicates that the large body size is a trait that developed early in the group, but the gigantic size, of more than , evolved only on three separate occasions. "H. miyou" had an estimated body weight of .
Phylogeny.
"Hilarcotherium" belongs to the family Astrapotheriidae, the family of advanced astrapotheres characterized by its developed tusks, separated by a diastema of the other teeth, the retracted nasal bones that indicate the presence of a trunk in his snout and the flattened astragalus. Within this group, "Hilarcotherium" shares with "Xenastrapotherium", "Uruguaytherium" and "Granastrapotherium" the lower canines that are horizontally inserted into the jaw, in addition to the characteristics of the molars (without labial cingulum, an inner protuberance of the molars), indicating that "Hilarcotherium" and the others genera already mentioned belongs to the subfamily Uruguaytheriinae, a group that colonized the equatorial region of South America during the Miocene until their extinction in the middle of such period, in contrast with other astrapotheres only known in the south of the continent.
Cladogram based in the phylogenetic analysis published in the original description article by Vallejo-Pareja "et al"., 2015, showing the position of "Hilarcotherium":


Mount Manengouba

Mount Muanenguba (also spelled Manenguba or Mwanenguba) is a volcano in the Southwest Province of Cameroon. The Manenguba shrew and endemic vegetal species are native to the mountain. The area is featured in the documentary "The Mists of Mwanenguba" with botanist Martin Cheek.


Bagualia

Bagualia (meaning "wild horse" in Spanish, after Bagual Canyon, the type locality), is an extinct genus of eusauropod sauropod dinosaur, from the Early Jurassic of Argentina. The type species, Bagualia alba was formally described in 2020.
Description.
Remains of "Bagualia" consist of many bones from three individuals, including vertebrae from the neck, limb bones and skull and teeth elements. The size of "Bagualia" was likely brought on by a newly formed ecosystem and climate shifts, which were all caused by volcanic activity in the Southern hemisphere during the Early Jurassic. While the harsh climate and volcanic activity drove most sauropodomorphs to extinction, "Bagualia" was able to adapt to newly-sprouting conifers and plants, using its long neck to snip plant matter from them while staying in place, conserving energy. Its teeth are surrounded by a thick layer of enamel, roughly 7x thicker than other extinct herbivores, enabling the animal to better shear conifer leaves. The digestive system of "Bagualia" was also a likely reason why it grew to such a large size, and another function of its long neck has been proposed: it may have dissipated heat in a similar fashion to how elephants use their ears to do the same.
Classification.
"Bagualia" was placed in a phylogenetic analysis and emerged as an early member of Eusauropoda. Due to its provenance from the Cañadon Asfalto Formation, which the describers date to the Toarcian, 179 Ma, they see it as evidence of a eusauropod dominance after an Early Jurassic global warming event, replacing more basal sauropodomorphs. Their cladogram is shown below, with clade names added by definition:


Snake Ridge Formation

The Snake Ridge Formation is a Mesozoic geologic formation in Mexico. Dinosaur remains are among the fossils that have been recovered from the formation, although none have yet been referred to a specific genus.


Alcamarinayoc

Alcamarinayoc (possibly from Aymara and Quechua "allqamari" mountain caracara) or Colque Cruz (possibly from Aymara and Quechua "qullqi" money, silver, Spanish "cruz" cross) is a mountain in the Vilcanota mountain range in the Andes of Peru. It is situated in the Cusco Region, Quispicanchi Province, Ocongate District. Alcamarinayoc lies northwest of the peak of Chumpe, north of Quevesere and northeast of Ichhu Ananta.


Paleobiota of the Posidonia Shale

The Posidonia Shale or Posidonienschiefer Formation is a geological formation of southwestern Germany, northern Switzerland, northwestern Austria, southeast Luxembourg and the Netherlands, that spans about 3 million years during the Early Jurassic period (early Toarcian stage). It is known for its detailed fossils, especially sea fauna, listed below. Composed mostly by black shale, the formation is a Lagerstätte, where fossils show exceptional preservation (Including exquisite soft tissues), with a thickness that varies from about 1 m to about 40 m on the Rhine level, being on the main quarry at Holzmaden between 5 and 14 m. Some of the preserved material has been transformed into fossil hydrocarbon Jet, specially wood remains, used for jewelry. The exceptional preservation seen on the Posidonia Shale has been studied since the late 1800s, finding that a cocktail of chemical and environmental factors let to such an impressive conservation of the marine fauna. The most common theory is the changes on the oxygen level, where the different anoxic events of the Toarcian left oxygen-depleted bottom waters, with the biota dying and falling to the bottom without any predator able to eat the dead bodies.
Dinoflagellata.
Dinoflagellate cysts.
The evolutionary burst of the Toarcian Dinoflajellates led the first appearance and rapid radiation of the Phallocystaceae ("Susainium", "Parvocysta", "Phallocysta", "Moesiodinium" and related forms). This occurred at the time of a wide-spread Lower Toarcian bituminous anoxia-derived shale of the "Posidonienschiefer Formation". Is recovered on the Posidonienschiefer, Pozzale, Italy, Asturias, Spain, Bornholm, Denmark, the Lusitanian Basin of Portugal, the Jet Rock Formation in Yorkshire and to the "Schistes Carton" in northern France. Whether there is a causal connection in this co-occurrence of Phallocystaceae and bituminous facies is a problem still to be resolved. This family has its acme in diversity and quantity in the latest Toarcian and became less important in the Aalenian.
Algae.
Includes abundant variety of algae, such as the genus of colonial Green algae Botryococcus, or the unicellular algal bodies Tasmanites, and other small examples. Algae are a good reference for changes on the oxygen conditions along the Toarcian.
Fungi.
Fungal Spores, hypae and undeterminated remains are a rare element of the otherwise openmarine deposits of the Posidonienschiefer formation, but where recovered at Dormettingen. This fungal remains are composed mostly by indeterminate spores and indicate oxygenated environments and suitable transportation by rivers.
Plantae.
The macroflora of the Posidonia slate can be described as extremely poor in species. Apart from the remains of Horsetails, it is without exception the remains of coarse branches and fronds from gymnosperms, in which one has a certain can assume transport resistance. Remains of Ferns are completely missing, except for tall arboreal ferns (Peltaspermales). Mostly of the flora was reported from the area of Braunschweig. The major explanation for the flora could be that the plants in question are mono-or oligotypic stands on the edge of the waters that flow into the Posidonienschiefer sea, probably tear away in the course of flood events, easily fragmented during transport and wave waves, possibly especially in the occasional storm events postulated. In terms of taphonomy, this would result in a comparison with today's reed Phragmites, which can form extensive stocks on the edge of shallower and slowly flowing waters ("Reed belts"). The Wood remnants clearly indicate one higher diversity of Coniferous flora in the delivery area than the remains of leafy branches. This fact is likely to be proportionate, similar to that frequent occurrence of charcoalized or gagged trunks, mostly of them are believed to be "driftwoods" that only take a long time drifting also suggests a frequent settlement with mussels and full-grown Sea Lilies. The deposition settings are at large distance from the nearest coastline (for southern Germany about 100 kilometers), making only plants strong to transportation able to resist enougth to get deposited. At Irlbach and Kheleim, NE of Regensburg, where the Posidonienschiefer has it´s nearmainland deposit with abundant sand, a rich desposit filled with plant remains of different kind (Seds, Reproductive organs, Leafs, Stems, Cuticles and wood) with traces of coal was recovered, hovewer, it was never studied in depth. Of all the plant material expected only a few Bennetites leafs and two conifer branches with leaves where cited and none studied.
At the Austrian realm The sachrang Member was developed in the basinal area, while the Unken Member, sandwiched between red, often condensed limestones, represents the marginal facies. Due to be more marginal and connected with the southern Vindelician land, the most diverse palynological assamblages of the formation are found, transported from zonas with moldanuvian granites as proven by the feldespar accumulations.
Phytoclasts.
Phytoclasts have been recovered from several sections on the formation, but only studied in depth from the Dotternhausen and specially Dormettingen. Here two kinds of Phytoclasts where recovered, opaque phytoclasts (charcoal, indicator of wildfire activity on nearby landmasses, indicator of seasonal alterations of the water column) and translucent phytoclasts (indicator of proximal landmasses with high aviability of wood and other plant material, as well transport conditions). On the lowermost part of the section opaque phytoclasts are low (15% of the total organic matter) while tranlucent are incredibily abundant (40%), lowering it´s abundance to a 20-10% on the next section. The Exaratum Subzone is the only one with an inverse trend and more abundance of opaque phytoclasts. On the Bifrons level, both types reach between a 15% and a 30%, showing a rapid increase, to decrease on the end of the section to values of less than a 10%. Opaque Phytoclasts, for a supposed marine deposit are relatively abundant on some sections, whose decreasing on others suggest (along with increasing levels of Kaolinite) an increased delivery of land plant material by rivers, from areas with wetter climate and less frequent fires, while its rise suggest the opposite, nearby continental setting with dry climate and continuous wildfire activity.
Fossil wood.
Fossil Wood increases on the marginal Unken Member, with great amounts of logs and fragments of more than 1 m. Surface studies suggest relationships with the wood genera identified on the coeval Úrkút Manganese Ore Formation.
Ichnofossils.
The major ichnological analyses of the Posidonian Shale come from Dotternhausen/Dormettingen, where the ichnogenus "Phymatoderma" formed the so called Tafelfleins and Seegrasschiefer. The Tafelflein bed was deposited under anoxic bottom and pore water, where a recover of oxygen allow the Phymatoderma-producers return. The two organic-rich layers (Tafelfleins and Seegrasschiefer) are characterized by the dense occurrence of trace fossils such as "Chondrites" and "Phymatoderma", done episodically due to the fall of the oxygen levels. The Coeval more nearshore Swiss deposits referred Posidonian Shale (Rietheim Member) hosted similar trace fossils asthose recovered on SW Germany. Tougth this setting apparently evolved faster to more oxic-to-dysoxic bottom waters.
At Unken, laminated deposits of red limestone suggest well oxygenated active waters (as lack shale), where high amounts of "Chondrites" are found.
Invertebrata.
Porifera.
In the non-bituminous facies located on Obereggenen im Breisgau (Shore of the Black Forest High), especially the lower semicelatum subzone, pyritized individual needles of silica sponges (Demospongiae and Hexactinellida) are found, rarely on pelagic layers to very often on the low depth marine deposits. They are usually associated with radiolarian stone cores. In Dusslingen and Reutlingen, these sponge needles could be barytized in phosphorites of the Haskerense subzone and are much more common here than in any other zone of the Lower Toarcian. These needles are absent in the bituminous horizons of the entire Lower Toarcian.
Increased amounts of Sponge needles (dominated by Hexactinellida) are also found on the arenaceous facies of the nearshore unit that is the Unken member, being the only section if it´s region that hosts them, probably due to be an active and well oxygenated bottom. The location of this member as a possible bay on the south of the vindelician land probably allow to the development of more pre-Toarcian AOE conditions, hence the presence of biota otherwise rare on bituminous layers.
Arthropoda.
Insecta.
Insects are a common terrestrial animals that were probably washed into the sea due to monsoon conditions present on the Posidonia Shale.
Echinodermata.
Echinoderm debris is pretty abundant on the shale-free Unken and Salzburg members, including Crinoid skeleton elements, also that of the Ophiurida; the Echinoids take their place, where really blossomed at that time. That´s why Pedicellaria are observed very often.
Vertebrata.
Amniota.
Ichthyosauria.
Inderminate specimens are known.
Saurischia.
Possible teeth from Dinosaurs are known from the Lias Clay pit of Unterstürmig (Referred as "Various Archosaur teeth"). "Dinosaur Fossils" are cited to be present on several levels on Schandelah.


Zuluzum Formation

The Zuluzum Formation is a geologic formation in Mexico. It preserves fossils dating back to the Neogene period.


Ananta (Puno)

Ananta is a mountain in the Vilcanota mountain range in the Andes of Peru, about high. It is situated in the Puno Region, Carabaya Province, Corani District. Ananta lies south of the mountain Macho Ritti, west of the lake Mancacocha and north of the lake Puytococha.


Eoconstrictor

Eoconstrictor is an extinct genus of boid snake, which supposedly had infrared vision, from the Eocene of Germany (Messel Pit). The type species, E. fischeri is known from multiple well-preserved specimens found in the Messel Pit of Germany. It was originally named as "Palaeopython fischeri" by Stephan Schaal in 2004, but examination of the genus showed that it represented a distinct lineage; it was renamed as the new genus "Eoconstrictor" in 2020.


Chacabuco

Chacabuco is one of the many abandoned nitrate or "saltpeter" towns ("oficinas salitreras" in Spanish) in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. Other nitrate towns of the Atacama Desert include Humberstone and Santa Laura Saltpeter Works. Unlike most of the other ghost towns in the Atacama Desert, Chacabuco became a concentration camp during the Pinochet regime in 1973. To this day, it remains surrounded by approximately 98 lost landmines, left by the Chilean military when Chacabuco was used as a prison camp.
Nitrate town history.
Founded in 1924 by the Lautaro Nitrate Company Ltd., Chacabuco soon fell into ruin as the nitrate mining boom in Chile came to an abrupt halt at the end of the 1930s. Synthetic nitrate had been invented in Germany at the turn of the 20th century and by the 1930s and 40s had severely crippled northern Chile's nitrate industry. What had accounted for virtually 50% of Chile's Gross National Product fell to almost zero within a few decades. A total of 170 nitrate towns were shut down throughout Chile's Atacama Desert, only one remains open today, María Elena, about 95 kilometers north of Chacabuco. Chacabuco shut its doors in 1938. As a town, it had only survived 14 years.
Concentration camp history.
In 1971, president Salvador Allende declared Chacabuco a Historic Monument of Chile, at which point restoration began. But in 1973, after the military coup, Pinochet turned it into a concentration camp until the end of 1974. As a concentration camp, it held up to 1,800 prisoners many of whom were doctors, lawyers, artists, writers, professors and workers from all over Chile.
Chacabuco today.
By the 1990s, Chacabuco was in need of extensive restoration and several international organizations began the restoration of parts of Chacabuco. In 1991, a former political prisoner of Chacabuco, Roberto Saldívar, returned to Chacabuco in order to live in the abandoned town and guard it against vandalism and pillaging. He lived there almost completely alone until January 2006. Pedro Barreda replaced Roberto when he left as caretaker of Chacabuco. Currently living in Chacabuco alone, Pedro considers himself to be Roberto's apprentice and remains dedicated to the cause Roberto started.


Dahomey Gap

In West Africa, the Dahomey Gap refers to the portion of the Guinean forest-savanna mosaic that extends all the way to the coast in Benin, Togo, and Ghana, thus separating the forest zone that covers much of the south of the region into two separate parts. The forest region west of the gap is called the Upper Guinean forests or Guinean forest zone, and the portion east of the gap is called the Lower Guinean forests, Lower Guinean-Congolian forests, or Congolian Forest Zone.
The major city in the Gap is Accra. Several other cities, such as Kumasi, exist on the fringe of the Gap.
Causes of dryness.
The dryness of the Dahomey Gap is unusual, given that it lies surrounded by a very wet monsoon belt on all sides, and no mountains block moisture. Yet, Accra, which is in the heart of the Gap, receives only of rainfall per year — less than half the amount needed to sustain tropical rainforest (which would be expected at a latitude of 6° N).
The cause of the dryness of the Dahomey Gap can simply be explained thus:
Geological history.
Evidence from biogeography suggests that the Dahomey Gap has had significance for up to 90 million years. Murphy and Collier, in their analysis of the Aplocheiloid fishes show a split in the African species which they attribute to the presence of an epicontinental sea between the late Cenomanian and early Eocene.
 This discontinuity had earlier been noted in plant species by White and is supported by an analysis of the "Coffea" clade by Maurin et al.
The Dahomey Gap has existed in its present form for only about four thousand years. For most of the Quaternary, dry conditions due to a much colder Atlantic Ocean (aided by extensive cold currents from ice sheets in Europe and North America) have meant that the present-day forest zone has supported very little or no rainforest. In interglacial periods, however, rainfall throughout West Africa has often been so heavy that the Gap has become wet enough to support rainforest, thus eliminating the savanna.


Tucumilla Formation

The Tucumilla Formation is a Tremadocian geologic formation of southern Bolivia. The sandstones, shales and siltstones crop out in the José María Avilés and Eustaquio Méndez Provinces.
Fossil content.
The formation has provided the following fossils:


Pneumatostega

Pneumatostega is an extinct genus of rhytidosteid temnospondyl from the early Triassic period of Cape Province of South Africa. It is known from the holotype BPI F981, a dorsal mould of a skull roof and from the referred specimen SAM 11188, partial skull fragments and postcranial remains recovered from the "Lystrosaurus" Assemblage Zone in the Beaufort Group near Middelburg. This genus was named by J. W. Cosgriff and J. M. Zawiskie in 1979, and the type species is "Pneumatostega potamia".


Elizabeth Springs

Elizabeth Springs is a heritage-listed artesian springs in Diamantina Lakes, Shire of Diamantina, Queensland, Australia. It is one of the springs of the Great Artesian Basin (GAB). It was added to the Australian National Heritage List on 4 August 2009.
History.
Aboriginal Australians have used the artesian springs of the GAB for an extended period of time. Some of these GAB artesian springs feature in Aboriginal myths and hold significant spiritual and cultural values for indigenous communities. Artesian springs were, and still are, a valuable resource for the support of wildlife, and were a vital source of fresh water in an arid environment.
The need for fresh water was also obvious to the first European settlers who ventured west of the Great Dividing Range. These early settlers, encouraged by good seasons, brought their sheep and cattle out onto the great rolling plains. They soon learned that inland Australia was a harsh environment where droughts were common.
The inland of Australia is traversed by streams but these rarely flow and have few permanent waterholes. Unpredictable rainfall and high evaporation meant that early dams and earth tanks built to service the growing population and pastoral industry were unreliable. Permanent water supplies were needed to allow livestock to survive on the arid plains and to provide supplies for the growing service towns.
Europeans first discovered the artesian groundwater of the GAB in 1878 when a shallow bore sunk near Bourke in New South Wales produced flowing water. Many bores were soon drilled near the margins of the GAB in New South Wales and South Australia. In 1885 the Queensland Government Geologist decided to drill a deep bore at Blackall to try to prove the existence of deep artesian supplies in Queensland and provide reliable water supplies during the drought. However, before the completion of this bore, the first artesian flow in Queensland was obtained near Cunnamulla in 1887.
The number of bores drilled in Queensland increased from 34 to 524 in the ten-year period from 1889 to 1899. By 1915 over 1,500 flowing artesian bores had been drilled throughout the Basin. The assurance of a reliable water supply for settlers and their stock meant the development of a valuable sheep and cattle industry. Thousands of kilometres of bore drains were excavated to distribute water around properties, thus allowing sheep and cattle to be raised on the vast Mitchell grass, mulga and spinifex plains. Bore drains are small, open channels that can extend 100 kilometres or more.
The water from the GAB continues to be of vital importance to outback regions of Queensland, New South Wales and South Australia. This water is often the only available supply for towns and properties for their domestic and stockwatering requirements. The GAB also supplies water for minor irrigation works, key mining and extractive industries, the petroleum industry, an emerging tourism industry and limited industrial purposes. Sound management of this important natural resource by the present users will ensure that future generations may also benefit from this reliable water source.
Description.
Elizabeth Springs is at about 101ha, comprising Lot 1 on SP120220.
The Great Artesian Basin is one of the largest artesian systems in the world and occupies about 22% of the Australian continent. Artesian springs lie around the rim of the GAB, occurring in complexes of springs known as a "supergroup", and are the natural outlets of the artesian aquifers from which groundwater of the GAB flows to the surface.
The artesian springs, also known as mound springs, are loosely divided into recharge springs and discharge springs. Recharge springs are primarily found along the GAB's eastern rim on the Great Dividing Range where the GAB aquifers outcrop in an area of relatively high rainfall allowing recharge. The recharge springs release excess GAB recharge water or, in topographic lows intercept the GAB recharge aquifers. The western margin of the GAB also has an area where the GAB aquifers outcrop but recharge is minimal as rainfall is low and intermittent. Discharge springs are those that release groundwater that has entered the GAB from the recharge zones, which flows towards the GAB's southern, southwestern, western and northern margins. Groundwater dating research has found that water in furthest areas from the recharge areas has been moving through the GAB's porous rock strata (aquifers) for up to a million years. Elizabeth Springs are regarded as a discharge spring complex and consists of at least five active artesian mound springs together with a few semi-active mounds immediately adjacent.
There are eleven supergroups in the main part of the GAB extending from Bourke in New South Wales and Lake Eyre in South Australia, and two outlier spring supergroups on Cape York Peninsula, including one on the Peninsula's northern tip. The GAB springs and spring complexes number around six hundred, but one "spring" may represent between two and four hundred spring outlets and supergroups may be regional clusters of such springs, often covering relatively small areas. GAB springs range in size from small springs only a few metres across such as Bundoona Springs, in southern Queensland, to major complexes of up to sixty springs with quite large pools such as Dalhousie Springs, in northern South Australia. Some GAB artesian springs have associated discharge mounds that consist of mud, but most of the springs deposit calcium carbonate, especially the discharge springs, or other salts from the mineral-rich waters discharging from the springs. These evaporites typically form characteristic salt deposits around the spring outflow that can extend for several hundred metres as a distinctive white tail, sometimes yellow or even black, often with a central carbonate mound grading into sulphate and chloride salts. In many instances, particularly among South Australian GAB springs, these deposits combine with wind-blown sand, mud and accumulated plant debris to form mounds around the spring outflow, with the resulting formation resembling a small volcano, colloquially called a "mound spring". Many of the Queensland GAB springs are "softer" and fail to develop anything more substantial than a mound of a few centimetres to a few metres in height, hence the use of the more readily interpreted term of "artesian spring" rather than "mound spring".
Mound formation of GAB springs is controlled by a range of factors, including groundwater discharge and evaporation rates, hydrochemistry, influence of organic versus organic carbonate precipitation and local subsidence of the mound. Dating of GAB springs using thermoluminescence, uranium-thorium and carbon-14 dating of quartzose sands and carbonate springs deposits have produced dates of more than 740,000± years. Research has found large spring complex deposits reflect geological and hydrological changes in eastern and central Australia during the last Quaternary (last 2.6 million years) and provide an understanding of long-term changes prior to human intervention.
Groundwater dating, using carbon-14 and chlorine-36 studies, has found water aged several thousand years near recharge areas and more than a million years near the centre of the GAB. The groundwater moves slowly, at less than one metre per year to approximately five metres per year, generally in a south, southwest, west direction and also northwards in the northern portion of the GAB.
Elizabeth Springs form part of the Springvale River supergroup, one of the two most westerly supergroups in Queensland, and lie approximately 300 kilometres south-southeast of Mount Isa. The Springvale supergroup is a group of springs that, with the exception of Elizabeth Springs, are largely extinct or heavily modified. The main group of springs comprising Elizabeth Springs extends over an area of approximately 400 by 500 metres and consists of a series of low mounds and travertine-encrusted outflows. The mounds and surrounding outflows and seepages are well vegetated with sedges and a range of other species including large areas of the spring endemic Eriocaulon carsonii subsp. carsonii, the salt pipewort, which is a perennial and a nationally EPBC-listed threatened species.
GAB artesian springs are a significant refuge in arid and semi-arid Australia, providing one of the few sources of natural permanent water. Estimates of the age of artesian springs have concluded that individual springs may last for up to a few hundred thousand years, but spring groups collectively may last possibly up to several million years. The presence of such permanent freshwater in inland Australia over the past few million years has provided habitat for a wide array of fish, invertebrates and plants that have been "stranded" in GAB artesian springs as inland Australia has dried out.
Ecologically GAB artesian springs are considered an evolutionary refuge as they allow wetland dependent (specialised habitat) species to persist as their original geographic range becomes uninhabitable due to drying over an extended period of time because of climatic change.
With the contraction of their main range, relictual species are hypothesised to have evolved different characteristics from their original stock, leading to the high levels of endemism (the frequency of species with restricted distributions) in isolated GAB artesian spring groups. Hence artesian springs provide the localised habitat requirements for a suite of endemic (restricted to one or more GAB spring) fish and aquatic invertebrate species which include hydrobiid molluscs, isopods, ostracods, amphipods, copepods and flatworms.
GAB artesian springs hold plants and animals that have evolved into new species found nowhere else. The presence of endemic species, and large peat mounds, indicates that some GAB springs have been active for a very long time. Hydrobiid snails are the best studied of these endemic groups. Hydrobiid snails are the most diverse of all freshwater gastropods and frequently have small distribution ranges, resulting in high levels of endemism. This makes them excellent candidates for evolutionary studies on endemism and speciation and for use as potential indicators (surrogates) of the importance of environments such as GAB artesian springs for other, less well-studied freshwater taxa. Hydrobiid snails are particularly well represented in GAB artesian springs with well over 23 taxa and five genera, although each mound complex or aggregation is separated by hundreds of kilometres. It has been hypothesised that this is a result of ancestral Gondwanan hydrobiids being stranded by the increasing aridity of inland Australia and being isolated in the permanent waters of GAB artesian springs. Recent work has demonstrated that the GAB hydrobiid snails have evolved in three separate radiations, one in Queensland and two in South Australia, with the Queensland hydrobiids and those of South Australia being completely unrelated.
The Elizabeth Springs, on its own and collectively with the other significant discharge springs comprising the GAB springs, are notable examples of the endemism exhibited by GAB artesian springs. Elizabeth Springs has one endemic snail and one endemic fish. It also has four endemic GAB artesian spring plant species as well as five relict spring plant species, plants that have survived from when inland Australia was wetter. A number of other possible endemic invertebrates also exist at the springs. In addition at least one species of frog, four species of reptile, 50 species of birds, four species of mammals, and 13 species of plants are known from the vicinity of the springs from a species list generated by the Australian Natural Heritage Assessment Tool, and as detailed in a Queensland Herbarium report based on comprehensive ground surveys.
Condition.
Surveys over the last twenty years have shown that most of the remaining active GAB artesian springs in Queensland are suffering damage from draw-down or stock. Trampling by stock or modification of the spring to improve access for stock is a serious threat to GAB springs. Trampling (also known as pugging) modifies the physical structure of the microhabitat, which are small scale habitat zones with different environment conditions, and if serious enough, removes the microhabitat entirely. Modification of the spring, normally by digging the spring out to improve the pooling of water, removes the microhabitat altogether.
In 2004 there was evidence of cattle grazing within the Elizabeth Springs reserve, with some trampling of the seepages and outflows surrounding the mounds. However, since fencing after 2004 the overall condition of the Elizabeth Springs has vastly improved reducing the previous impacts on the intact relictual biota.
The endemic species associated with GAB artesian springs, particularly the vascular plants and invertebrates, appear to be highly sensitive to changes in water flow or conditions at the springs. This is at least in part due to the dependence of many species on microhabitats such as seepages of only a few millimetres depth. A range of human activities that have been occurring over the last 120 years impacts GAB artesian springs. The most serious is groundwater extraction resulting in draw-down of water pressure at the spring, primarily but not exclusively due to numerous uncapped artesian bores and inefficient earth drains, and the loss or modification of microhabitat and ultimately the extinction of the spring. Groundwater extraction has been implicated in the extinction of many springs and has been partly addressed by the extensive GAB bore-capping programme. Extraction for other uses such as mining and town water supply remains a substantial impact. Reductions in flow at Elizabeth Springs have been observed, although in some other springs flow appears to have stabilised. Draw-down remains the most serious threat to GAB artesian springs.
Lastly, the spread of the introduced mosquitofish (Gambusia affinis) is a threat to the freshwater endemics of all the GAB artesian springs. Gambusia has not been reported from Elizabeth Springs.
The GAB Sustainability Initiative (GABSI) is a jointly funded initiative of the Federal and State governments and pastoral bore owners. GABSI aims to preserve the pressure of the Great Artesian Basin, and reduce water waste, through rehabilitating uncontrolled bores and replacing bore drains with polyethylene pipes, tanks and troughs for livestock water. Although a substantial number of bores are now being fully controlled with water distributed by pipelines to tanks and troughs, about 80% of the total outflow from the Basin is still wasted because of inefficient water delivery systems.
This condition report drew on a number of source.
Heritage listing.
Elizabeth Springs is one of a suite of nationally important artesian springs in the Great Artesian Basin, which is the world's largest artesian basin. The artesian springs have been the primary natural source of permanent water in most of the Australian arid zone over the last 1.8 Million years (the Pleistocene and Holocene periods). These artesian springs, also known as mound springs, provide vital habitat for more widespread terrestrial vertebrates and invertebrates with aquatic larval young, and are a unique feature of the arid Australian landscape.
As these artesian springs are some distance from each other in the Australian inland, and individually each one covers a relatively tiny area, their isolation has allowed the freshwater animal lineages to evolve into distinct species, which include fish, aquatic invertebrates (crustacean and freshwater snail species) and wetland plants. This results in a high level of endemism, or species that are found nowhere else in the world.
Elizabeth Springs is nationally significant as it holds a suite of species which are genetically and evolutionarily distinct from other Great Artesian Basin springs, including an endemic freshwater snail and an endemic fish species. Elizabeth Springs also holds four of the eleven known Great Artesian Basin spring wetland endemic plants, along with five plant species not recorded within 500 kilometres of the springs, which are indicative of a wetter past.
Elizabeth Springs is the only remaining relatively intact Great Artesian Basin spring with extant biota (fauna and flora) in far western Queensland and is regarded as one of the most important artesian springs because of its isolation, intactness and the extinction of other springs. Over 74% of the artesian springs in Queensland are extinct (no longer flowing) and all the artesian springs in New South Wales are extinct or badly damaged.
Elizabeth Springs was listed on the Australian National Heritage List on 4 August 2009 having satisfied the following criteria.
Criterion A: Events, Processes
Elizabeth Springs is one of a suite of important artesian discharge springs in the Great Artesian Basin for endemic fish, invertebrates (including hydrobiid gastropod molluscs) and plants, and has also been ranked by CSIRO as a nationally "significant" semi-arid and arid refugia in Australia for regional endemics of aquatic invertebrates (isopods, ostracods, and hydrobiid molluscs) and fish.
GAB artesian springs are important for illustrating the role of evolutionary refugia for relict species, which have evolved into distinct and endemic species in the GAB springs. Elizabeth Springs contains one artesian spring endemic hydrobiid snail, Jardinella isolata; an endemic fish species the Elizabeth Springs goby Chlamydogobius micropterus (, and four of the 11 known GAB spring wetland endemic plants. Elizabeth Springs contains the threatened saltmarsh pipewort (Eriocaulon carsonii subsp. carsonii), a relict species of tropical Australia that is largely endemic to the artesian springs of the GAB. They also contain three of the other GAB spring endemics: Eragrostis fenshamii, Fimbristylis sp. and Myriophyllum artesium. Elizabeth Springs also contains five other relict plant species, which are not recorded within 500 km of the springs: Isotoma fluviatilis, Pennisetum alopecuroides, Plantago gaudichaudii, Schoenus falcatus and Utricularia caerulea.
Criterion B: Rarity
Extant artesian springs in the GAB are a geographically rare phenomenon, each one covering a tiny area within the basin. Over 74% of the GAB springs in Queensland are extinct (no longer flowing) and all the GAB artesian springs in New South Wales are extinct or badly damaged. Elizabeth Springs is regarded as one of the most important GAB artesian springs because of its isolation, relative intactness and the extinction of other springs in far Western Queensland.
Criterion D: Principal characteristics of a class of places
The GAB is the world's largest example of an artesian basin and associated artesian springs. GAB artesian springs are the primary sources of permanent fresh water within the arid zone since at least the late Pleistocene (the last 1.8 million years) and are therefore a unique feature of the arid Australian landscape. As the primary natural source of permanent fresh water in most of the arid zone, GAB artesian springs represent vital habitat for more widespread terrestrial vertebrates, and invertebrates with aquatic larvae. Elizabeth Springs is one of a suite of important artesian discharge GAB Springs that are outstanding examples of the endemism exhibited by artesian springs individually and collectively. Species found at Elizabeth Springs include an endemic freshwater hydrobiid snail Jardinella isolata, and an endemic fish species, the Elizabeth Springs goby Chlamydogobius micropterus. Elizabeth Springs is the only remaining relatively intact GAB spring with extant biota (fauna and flora) in far Western Queensland and holds a suite of species which are genetically and evolutionarily distinct from other GAB springs.


Uranocentrodon

Uranocentrodon is an extinct genus of the family Rhinesuchidae. Known from a skull, "Uranocentrodon" was a large predator with a length up to . Originally named "Myriodon" by van Hoepen in 1911, it was transferred to a new genus on account of the name being preoccupied in 1917. It has been synonymized with "Rhinesuchus", but this has not been widely supported. It was also originally considered to be of Triassic age, but more recent analysis has placed its age as just below the Permian-Triassic boundary.
History and specimens.
Fossils of the animal now known as "Uranocentrodon" were first discovered in a sandstone quarry in the Normandien Formation near Senekal in Free State, South Africa. The first example of these fossils was a fragmentary skull excavated by a local family. Subsequent excavations and searches undertaken by various parties unearthed more specimens which hailed from the quarry. Among these specimens included three nearly complete skeletons overlapping each other. The initial skull was determined to belong to the same individual as one of the skeletons. The skull and three skeletons were acquired by the Transvaal Museum and given the designations TM 75, TM 75d, and TM75h by E.C.N. van Hoepen. In 1911, he gave the formal name "Myriodon senekalensis" to the specimens by means of a brief description published in Dutch. He published a more comprehensive description a few years later in 1915. Two additional skulls were mentioned in this description, although their whereabouts are currently unknown. In 1917 it was determined that the name "Myriodon" was already in use by a genus of fish, and that a new name had to be used. Thus, van Hoepen renamed "Myriodon senekalensis" to "Uranocentrodon senekalensis", which roughly translates to "prickle-toothed palate of Senekal". The original Transvaal Museum specimens have collectively been termed the syntypes of "Uranocentrodon".
Over time, additional remains were discovered. Around the same time as the Transvaal specimens were being described, Robert Broom discovered skull fragments which he considered to belong to a new species of "Rhinesuchus", "'Rhinesuchus major"'. However, this skull (given the designation 60C 1-1a) is now believed to belong to "Uranocentrodon", rendering "R. major" a junior synonym of the genus.
In 1915, Sidney Haughton, decided to synonymize "Uranocentrodon" (at that time still called "Myriodon") with "Rhinesuchus", although he kept it as a separate species within the genus. He also described another practically complete skeleton (including skull material) kept at the Bloemfontein Museum, a specimen now designated as NMQR 1483. He also mentioned a jaw fragment, now known as SAM-PK-2783.Most other analyses consider "Uranocentrodon" to be distinct from "Rhinesuchus". Other known remains include TM 185 (a skull described by Broom in 1930), TM 208 (a right forelimb), and CGP 4095 (another skull).
Paleobiology.
Gills.
The exquisite preservation of the original Transvaal skeletons allowed for delicate parts of the skeleton to be preserved. Among these parts include approximately three rows of tiny bones (branchial ossicles) covered with thin tooth-like structures (branchial denticles). These structures appeared near the neck of one of the skeletons, and almost certainly attached to the branchial arches of gills while the animal was alive. Although such bones are rare among stereospondyls and unknown in any other rhinesuchids, this may simply be due to the fact that the bones of other genera were preserved in more rough-grained sediments where such delicate bones could be broken or difficult to find.
Although evidently "Uranocentrodon" had gills of some kind, it is difficult to determine what kind of gills they were. On the one hand, they could have been internal gills like those of fish, which were hardly visible from the outside of the body. On the other hand, they could have been stalk-like external gills like those of modern salamander larvae or even neotenic adult salamanders such as the mudpuppy or axolotl. External gills had to have evolved from internal gills sometime during amphibian evolution, although the precise location of this transition is controversial. The gill-supporting bones preserved in ancient amphibians show many similarities with those of fish gills and salamander gills. Depending on which of these groups paleontologists compare the bones to, different types of gills can be inferred. This conundrum, known as Bystrow's paradox, has made it difficult to assess gills in ancient amphibians such as "Uranocentrodon".
Bystrow's paradox was finally resolved by a 2010 study. This study found that grooved ceratobrachnial structures (components of the branchial arches) are correlated with internal gills. Ancient tetrapods which preserved grooved ceratobranchials, such as the dvinosaur "Dvinosaurus", probably only had internal gills as adults. Nevertheless, external gills have been directly preserved as soft tissue in some temnospondyls. However, these situations only occur in larval specimens or members of specialized groups such as the branchiosaurids. One living species of lungfish ("Lepidosiren") has external gills as larvae which transform into internal gills as adults. Despite adult dvinosaur specimens having skeletal features correlated with internal gills, some larval specimens of another dvinosaur, "Isodectes" preserved soft tissue external gills. Thus, the gill development of dvinosaurs (and presumably other temnospondyls, such as "Uranocentrodon") mirrored that of "Lepidosiren". Despite this feature likely being an example of convergent evolution (as other lungfish exclusively possessed internal gills), it still remains a useful gauge for how temnospondyl gills developed. In conclusion, "Uranocentrodon's" gills were probably internal (like those of a fish) as an adult, but external (like those of a salamander) as a larva.
Body armor.
Some of the Transvaal specimens also preserved large patches of bony scutes or scales around the body. The scutes on the belly of the animal were arranged in parallel diagonal rows which converged at the midline of the body and diverged as the rows stretched towards the tail. Each scute had a ridge running down the middle, and the scutes further towards the midline overlapped the ones further out. Along the midline, a row of flat and wide scales stretched from the throat to the tail. While these belly scales were made of bone, scales on other parts of the body had less bone structure and were probably made of keratin instead.
The scales on the sides of the body were flatter and smaller than the bony belly scutes. The scutes on the back of the body were similar, although more rounded in shape, with a few larger scutes near the midline. The scales of the hind limbs and the underside of the hip region were similar to those of the back, although no integument was preserved on the forelimbs or tail. Thus, it is likely that at least the tail was unarmored and only covered with naked skin.
External links.
Photographs of the original specimens published by van Hoepen (1915)


Thliptosaurus

Thliptosaurus (meaning "compressed lizard") is an extinct genus of small kingoriid dicynodont from the latest Permian period of the Karoo Basin in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. It contains the type and only known species "T. imperforatus". "Thliptosaurus" is from the upper "Daptocephalus" Assemblage Zone, making it one of the youngest Permian dicynodonts known, living just prior to the Permian mass extinction. It also represents one of the few small bodied dicynodonts to exist at this time, when most other dicynodonts had large body sizes and many small dicynodonts (such as "Diictodon") had gone extinct. The unexpected discovery of "Thliptosaurus" in a region of the Karoo outside of the historically sampled localities suggests that it may have been part of an endemic local fauna not found in these historic sites. Such under-sampled localities may contain 'hidden diversities' of Permian faunas that are unknown from traditional samples. "Thliptosaurus" is also unusual for dicynodonts as it lacks a pineal foramen, suggesting that it played a much less important role in thermoregulation than it did for other dicynodonts.
While the name literally translates to "compressed lizard", referring to the severely crushed and flattened skull of the only known specimen, it also alludes to the Biblical "thlipsis", a time of tribulation and hardship preceding the End Times, alluding to the existence of "Thliptosaurus" just before the mass extinction at the end of the Permian, also known as the Great Dying.
Description.
"Thliptosaurus" was a small dicynodont (skull length of only long), but it displays several characteristics indicative of maturity in dicynodonts. Only the skull is known, but like other related dicynodonts it would have been a squat, sprawling quadruped with a short tail and a large head with a tortoise-like beak. "Thliptosaurus" appears completely toothless, lacking even in the distinctive tusks found in some other dicynodonts (including the closely related "Dicynodontoides"), although teeth may be obscured by the lower jaw if they are present. The post cranial skeleton is unknown, but probably resembled that of other kingoriids, such as "Kombuisia".
Skull.
The skull of "Thliptosaurus" is fairly typical for dicynodonts, being broad at the back with very large temporal fenestrae, with a much shorter snout that gently tapers to a blunt point. The nostrils aren't visible on the specimen, meaning they must have been placed on the very front of the snout facing forwards, and not on the sides. The tuskless caniniform process of the maxilla is prominent and sits well forward of the eyes. The front margin of the caniniform process is long and slopes gently downwards from the front, while the back margin rises steeply up to meet with the zygomatic arch below the eyes. The caniniform process is similar to that of "Dicynodontoides", but is lacking the tusks found in that genus. No other teeth are visible on the specimen, but as much of the maxilla is covered by the lower jaw it is impossible to be sure. The nasal bones sport three prominent well-pitted bosses with a rough, rugose texture. These bosses resemble those of "Dicynodontoides", with two flaring laterally over the front of the snout, split by the single fused premaxilla, and meeting with a third medial boss behind them.
The intertemporal region, or bar, is unusually wide for a kingoriid, composed of the broad frontal bones in the front and the flat exposed parietal bones behind them, each contacting with the single preparietal (a unique bone found in dicynodonts and some other therapsids) just behind the eyes. Very unusually for a dicynodont, "Thliptosaurus" has no visible pineal foramen, and the suture between the parietals appears uninterrupted for their whole length. Even if the parietal foramen existed and was obscured by deformation during fossilisation, it would had to have existed as a very thin slit between the parietals that did not contact the preparietal, which itself would be a highly unusual condition for a dicynodont. However, comparisons with other kingoriids indicate that the absence of the pineal foramen is likely a genuine feature.
Unfortunately, the palate is mostly obscured by the tightly occluded lower jaw, leaving only the pterygoids and the basicranium (the part of the skull underneath the braincase) readily visible. The pterygoids are relatively long and narrow, and straight for much of their length like those of "Compsodon" and "Dicynodontoides". The two pterygoids meet at a median pterygoid plate positioned relatively far back on the skull, which also results in the rami that contact the quadrate being angled at approximately 60 degrees to the skull's long axis. The occiput is poorly preserved and few details can be discerned, but the overall structure appears typical for dicynodonts, as is the basicranium.
Mandible.
The mandibular symphysis of the dentaries is long, creating a long, flattened shovel-like beak tip. The rest of the jaws is otherwise roughly v-shaped, as is typical for dicynodonts. The dentary has a tall plate on its sides that obscures the external mandibular fenestra, an unusual condition amongst dicynodonts. The coronoid process (a site for jaw muscle attachment) is unusually short compared to that of other kingoriids. The dentary also has a short horizontal shelf about halfway up its side, representing a greatly reduced lateral dentary shelf (a site of attachment for the external lateral adductor, an important jaw muscle in dicynodont feeding). The reflected lamina of the angular is relatively short, surrounded by a concave lateral exposure on each side. The articular has a curved, convex upper surface that contacts the condyles of the quadrate and extends beyond them, facilitating palinal (backwards) motion of the lower jaw, typical of dicynodonts.
Ontogeny.
The small size of "Thliptosaurus", combined with the taphonomic distortion and ontogenetic variability of some of its characteristic traits raised the possibility that the only known specimen of "Thliptosaurus" actually represented the juvenile of an unknown larger bodied animal, possibly even that of the contemporaneous kingoriid "Dicynodontoides". However, three traits typical of mature, fully grown dicynodonts were identified in the specimen. The snout is well ossified and fused together, with none of the irregular sutures observed in the juveniles of larger dicynodont species. There is no sign of a postfrontal bone, which is interpreted as fusing with the postorbital bone during ontogeny in other dicynodonts. Thirdly, the preparietal is small relative to the size of skull, unlike the large preparietal found in juvenile dicynodonts. These traits indicate that the holotype of "Thliptosaurus" is not a juvenile of a larger taxon, despite its small size, and represents a mature, small bodied dicynodont.
History of discovery.
The holotype and only known specimen of "Thliptosaurus", BP/1/2796, was discovered and collected by palaeontologist James Kitching in September, 1958 on an expedition at Stoffelton in western KwaZulu-Natal, near the town of Bulwer. This site records exposures of the Permian "Daptocephalus" Assemblage Zone (AZ) and Triassic "Lystrosaurus" Assemblage Zone across the Permo-Triassic boundary, and while of scientific importance has been relatively unexplored and under-sampled compared to more historically recognised localities in the Karoo Basin. Indeed, much of the specimens from this site were collected by Kitching himself, and many of them remain as yet unprepared and unstudied. The fossil can be recognised as belonging to the Permian "Daptocephalus" AZ by the light grey colour of the fossil bones and grey siltstone matrix surrounding them (contrasted with the yellow bones and red matrix of Triassic fossils). The specimen was not described until 2019 by palaeontologist Christian Kammerer, who diagnosed it as its own new distinct genus of dicynodont. The holotype is held in the collections of the Evolutionary Studies Institute at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg in South Africa.
The single skull of "Thliptosaurus" is nearly complete, but it has been severely crushed and flattened from top-to-bottom (dorsoventrally), and some broken areas of bone at the back of the skull have been restored using plaster. Details and sutures on the top of the skull are readily visible, but poor preservation and over-preparation have obliterated features on the sides and rear of the skull. The lower jaw is firmly occluded to the upper jaw, obscuring some details of the sides of the skull and many of the palate.
The generic name is from the Ancient Greek ' (') and (""), literally translated to mean "compressed lizard", referring to the flattened nature of the skull from being severely dorsoventrally compressed during fossilisation. The name also alludes to the Biblical "thlipsis", the name given to a period of great tribulations accompanying the End Times, as a play on the taxon's existence just before the Permian mass extinction, also known as the Great Dying. The specific name is from the Latin "imperforatus", meaning "unpunctured", referring to the greatly reduced pineal foramen in the roof of the skull, if it is not entirely absent altogether.
Classification.
"Thliptosaurus" was found to be a member of the clade Emydopoidea in the family Kingoriidae, closely related to the genera "Kombuisia" and "Dicynodontoides". "Thliptosaurus" shares with other kingoriids a dentary plate that occludes and obscures the mandibular fenestra, an arcing anterior process of the lacrimal that contacts the nasal, cutting off the maxilla from contacting the prefrontal bone, and an absence of the postfrontal bone (also shared with other kistecephalians). It shares an extremely reduced pineal foramen with the kingoriid "Kombuisia frerensis" and cistecephalid "Kawingasaurus". However, it is distinguished from these genera by having a moderately broad intertemporal bar, intermediate in width between that of "Kombuisia" and "Kawingasaurus". The intertemporal bar also has broad, flat exposures of the parietals, a primitive trait for dicynodonts but that has been lost in other kingoriids. A phylogenetic analysis using the latest iteration of the data matrix from Kammerer (2018), itself modified from Angielcyzk & Kammerer (2017), agreed with this interpretation. A simplified excerpt of the consensus tree from this analysis, focused in on the relationships of Emydopoidea, is shown in the cladogram below:
Kammerer noted that the recovery of "Myosaurus" as the sister taxon to Kingoriidae was unusual, as it is usually recovered as a close relative of "Cistecephalus". However, the support for this relationship was low, and so he did not regard this result with much significance. Similarly, the analysis recovered an 'expansive Endothiodontia', including several taxa not normally recovered in this clade, such as "Pristerodon" and Endothiodontidae, as successive outgroups to Emdyopoidea, but the support for this was also low. Otherwise, the analysis recovered a generally similar topology to other recent analyses of this data matrix.
Taxonomic distinction.
The small, crushed nature of the sole specimen of "Thliptosaurus" raised the possibility that it may belong to an existing genus, and the seemingly unique features are just taphonomic. The skull of "Thliptosaurus" was compared to similarly sized and crushed specimens of the other kingoriids "Kombuisia" and "Dicynodontoides", the latter of which co-existed with "Thliptosaurus". However, even when crushed flat, "Thliptosaurus" could be distinguished from the other two kingoriids by the greater width of the intertemporal bar, and the parietals remained obscured postorbitals in the other taxa while they are exposed in "Thliptosaurus". The pineal foramen was also still readily identifiable in the other kingoriid specimens, as would be expected for dorsoventral crushing. This implies that the characteristic broad temporal bar and absent pineal foramen of "Thliptosaurus" were not simply the result of taphonomic distortion, and are indeed genuine diagnostic characteristics of a distinct kingoriid taxon.
Palaeobiology.
Loss of the pineal foramen.
The seemingly total absence of the pineal foramen in "Thliptosaurus" is very unusual for dicynodonts, and it has otherwise only been recorded in the related kingoriid "Kombuisia frerensis" and cistecephalid "Kawingasaurus" (although its presence or absence is rarely intraspecifically variable in some other dicynodonts). The pineal foramen, supporting a pineal gland and pineal "third" eye is suggested to have played a role in thermoregulation for dicynodonts, allowing them to register changes in light levels throughout the day and yearly seasonal changes that would allow them respond and modify thermoregulatory behaviours, such as basking, as is recorded in modern tuataras and some lizards. The absence of the pineal complex in "Thliptosaurus" then suggests it was playing a less important role in thermoregulation, if any at all, although the reasons for this are unclear. The independent loss of the pineal foramen in advanced therocephalians and cynodonts across the Permo-Triassic boundary has been suggested to be a consequence of developing endothermic (i.e. warm blooded) metabolisms, something inferred not to have occurred in the contemporary dicynodonts or gorgonopsians.
The independent loss of the pineal foramen in "Thliptosaurus" and other kistecephalian dicynodonts may support an alternative hypothesis for the loss of the pineal foramen in therapsids. It's possible that changing global environmental conditions at the end of the Permian, such as global warming and the movement of the continents towards the equator, meant that less control was needed over thermoregulation in therapsids like "Thliptosaurus", decreasing the need for the pineal foramen until it was ultimately lost. This is similar to some modern tropical lizards, which have much reduced pineal eyes as they do not need to regulate their body temperature as well as lizards in more seasonal and temperate environments. These changes to therapsid thermoregulation influenced by the environment may then be more important to the acquisition of endothermy in mammal evolution than sometimes presumed.
Palaeoecology.
Late Permian small dicynodonts.
"Thliptosaurus" was one of the few small-bodied dicynodonts (i.e. those with a skull length >15 cm) present in the latest Permian just before the Permian mass extinction, as they had suffered a major decline in diversity after their success in the earlier Middle to early-Late Permian. Small dicynodonts went from being over three times as numerous as all other tetrapods combined in the "Tropidostoma" Assemblage Zone (primarily in the form of "Diictodon") to down to only 19.2% of total tetrapods in the lower "Daptocephalus" Assemblage Zone (AZ), and then to just 4% by the upper "Daptocephalus" AZ when "Thliptosaurus" had appeared. At the same time, larger species of dicynodonts were on the increase, occupying up to 64% of all tetrapods in the upper "Daptocephalus" AZ. The newly evolved "Lystrosaurus" in particular was especially abundant at 34% of the total. The presence of a previously unknown small dicynodont in the Upper "Daptocephalus" AZ then is surprising.
Despite their decline, small dicynodonts still survived the Permian mass extinction, as evidenced by the kingoriid "Kombuisia" and myosaurid "Myosaurus" from Antarctica and South Africa. Both were present during the Induan of the Early Triassic, but while "Myosaurus" perished shortly after "Kombuisia" persisted into the earliest Anisian of the Middle Triassic. The ancestor-descendant relationships of these small dicynodonts to those of the Permian is unclear, but they do not appear to be directly related to any known Permian species. It has been suggested that the ancestors of the small Triassic dicynodonts (as well as the successful Triassic Kannemeyeriiformes) must have been present outside of the well-sampled historical localities of the Karoo Basin. The discovery of "Thliptosaurus" may support this idea, as it could indicate that local, endemic second-order faunas existed amongst the more widespread well known faunas of the "Daptocephalus" AZ. More crucially, it suggests that such 'missing diversities' may be present even in the under-sampled localities of otherwise historically important regions like the Karoo Basin.
KwaZulu-Natal palaeoenvironment.
The environment of the upper "Daptocephalus" Assemblage Zone has been interpreted as well-drained floodplains, with a lower water table than the preceding wetter lower "Daptocephalus" AZ. This may have reduced the inferred marginal river and low undergrowth habitats that small dicynodonts are thought to have preferred, leading to their decline. Favourable habitats for small dicynodonts must have still existed, including in KwaZulu-Natal, as evidenced by "Thliptosaurus". In KwaZulu-Natal, "Thliptosaurus" co-existed with other more widespread fauna typical of the "Daptocephalus" AZ, namely the dicynodonts "Daptocephalus" itself and "Lystrosaurus". It also at least co-existed with the smaller dicynodont "Kwazulusaurus", which may represent another local endemic dicynodont species from KwaZulu-Natal (however, it's possibly a synonym of "Lystrosaurus"), as well as the large predatory therocephalian "Moschorhinus". Other therapsids known from elsewhere in the latest upper "Daptocephalus" AZ include the larger dicynodonts "Oudenodon", "Pelanomodon" and "Dinanomodon", the therocephalian "Promoschorhynchus" and remains of gorgonopsians.


2007 Tocopilla earthquake

The 2007 Tocopilla earthquake occurred on November 14 at . Its epicenter was located between Quillagua and Tocopilla, affecting the Tarapacá and the Antofagasta regions in northern Chile. The earthquake had a moment magnitude of 7.7 and lasted about 3 minutes and 35 seconds. Seventeen aftershocks of magnitude greater than 5.3, including one of magnitude 7.1 and two others of magnitude 6.3 or higher, were recorded. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center issued a tsunami warning, stating a tsunami had been generated; after one hour, this warning was cancelled. The earthquake was felt from Santiago, 1,245 km south from the epicenter, to La Paz, about 700 km north-northeast.
Tectonic summary.
The USGS reported that the earthquake resulted from the release of stresses generated by the subduction of the oceanic Nazca plate beneath the South American Plate. In this region, known as the Peru-Chile subduction zone, the Nazca Plate thrusts beneath South America at a rate of approximately 79 mm/year in an east-north-east direction. This earthquake indicates subduction-related thrusting, likely on the interface between these two plates.
This earthquake occurred near (and within) the southern end of the rupture area of the great magnitude 9.1 earthquake of 1877, which produced a destructive tsunami and whose source region has since the late 1970s been recognized as a potentially dangerous seismic gap. In 1995, a magnitude 8.0 earthquake occurred in the same subduction zone approximately 200 km further south of the November 14th event.
Damage and casualties.
At least two deaths have been attributed to this earthquake: an 88-year-old woman crushed under a collapsing wall at Tocopilla, and a 54-year-old woman whose exact cause of death remains unknown. There were also reports of widespread power outages in the region, including the cities of Antofagasta, Calama and Arica. The earthquake disrupted copper mining in the region; because Chile is the world's top supplier of copper, the earthquake caused prices of the metal to jump by more than six percent. Tin prices also rose four percent to reach a record high. There were reports of several dozen road workers trapped inside a collapsed highway tunnel. Two hundred homes were destroyed by the shaking and up to 15,000 people were displaced. In Tocopilla alone, 1,000 homes were demolished, representing 30 percent of all standing structures.


Palomo

Palomo ("dove"; after the shape of its glaciers) is a high Chilean stratovolcano located in the commune of Machali, Cachapoal province, Libertador General Bernardo O'Higgins Region, west of Caldera del Atuel. Together with Tinguiririca it is one of two volcanoes in the region with evidence of Holocene volcanism. The volcano is remote and knowledge on its geology and potential volcanic hazards is limited.
The edifice of the volcano is irregular and various estimates of its volume exist, ranging . The best estimate is considered to be . Palomo rises from an elevation of about , and it covers a surface area of . Beneath the volcano lie two calderas with diameters of and ; the summit has a double crater as well, which may reflect a northeastward migration of volcanic activity. northeast of Palomo lies the high Andrès subsidiary vent. This vent features a wide crater that opens to the south. Andrés is constructed on a granitoid basement that slopes into the valley of Rio Cortaderal, and its name relates to the son of Reynaldo Charrier, a geologist who described the subsidiary centre in 2010 and who hoped that his son would one day also know the mountain range. It and Palomo are located on the El Diablo fault; a number of other volcanoes and geothermal manifestations are located along its trace, which separates Mesozoic and Cenozoic geological formations.
The volcano is flanked by glaciers.
Several of these sizeable glaciers form the Rio Blanco, Rio Cortaderal and Rio de los Cipreses on the northern flank, which drain into the Cachapoal River. A thermal event in the volcano in 1847 caused a meltwater flood on the Cachapoal River. The southern slope features the Universidad Glacier, which forms the Rio San Andrés which drains into the Tinguiririrca River. With a snowline altitude of , it was the second longest glacier in Central Chile in 1958, but since then glaciers in the region have shrunk.
The edifice is mainly constructed by lava flows that bury parts of the calderas in the foot of the volcano. Palomo has erupted andesite and dacite, as well as basaltic andesite. All rocks are calc-alkaline rocks of medium potassium content. The main edifice rocks contain abundant phenocrysts dominated by plagioclase; clinopyroxene, orthopyroxene and other minerals are less prevalent. The Andrés edifice has a distinct composition, with more amphibole and olivine and less plagioclase than the main edifice.
Argon–argon dating has been used to date the rocks erupted by Palomo. The main summit yielded dates of 100,000 ± 40,000 years ago, while postglacial lavas of Andrés are dated at 40,000 ± 30,000 years ago, but volcanic activity at Palomo may have continued into pre-Hispanic times. Future activity at Palomo might generate lahars through the melting of ice, which could affect the valleys of the rivers draining the volcano.