A 240-million-year-old fossil disappeared for 20 years, then its rediscovery revealed a new reptile related to dinosaurs and crocodiles
Researchers have identified a new reptile species, Silescelida acristata, from a 240-million-year-old fossil that had been missing for two decades. The discovery provides new insights into the evolution of archosaurs, the lineage that includes dinosaurs and crocodiles.
Why it matters
This discovery fills a gap in the evolutionary history of archosaurs, helping scientists better understand the origins of major reptile groups.
A fossil found in southern Brazil is giving researchers a closer look at the reptiles that lived near the beginning of the archosaur lineage, the group that would eventually include dinosaurs and crocodile-line animals. The animal has been named ‘Silescelida acristata’ and is identified as an early-diverging eucrocopodan archosauriform from the Middle Triassic. A recent study published in the journal Scientific Reportsnotes that the specimen includes a left scapula, a right ilium and a left femur that were found together and are considered to belong to the same individual.How a lost fossil piece helped identify Silescelida acristataThe species was discovered at the Posto site near Dona Francisca in Rio Grande do Sul, where it was recovered from the Dinodontosaurus Assemblage Zone of the Pinheiros-Chiniquá Sequence. The rocks date to the Ladinian, placing the fossil in the Middle Triassic.
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