Altacreodus ("creodont from Alberta")[1] is an extinct genus of eutherian mammals. Fossils have been found in North America where they first appeared during the Late Cretaceous, and they died out prior to the start of the Paleocene. It is possibly one of the earliest known placental mammals in the fossil record.
| Altacreodus Temporal range: Late Cretaceous
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Scientific classification 
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| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Mirorder: | Ferae |
| Clade: | Pan-Carnivora (?) |
| Genus: | †Altacreodus Fox, 2015[1] |
| Type species | |
| †Altacreodus magnus Clemens & Russell, 1965[2]
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| Synonyms | |
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synonyms of species:
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The type species is "Cimolestes" magnus, which was renamed Altacreodus magnus in 2015.[1] Recent phylogenetic analyses suggests that genus Altacreodus is a member of clade Pan-Carnivora and the closest known sister taxon to genus Tinerhodon and the order Hyaenodonta,[3][4][5] based on anatomy of its teeth.[1] In some studies its position as a crown-group placental has been equivocal.[6]
References
edit- ^ a b c d Richard C. Fox (2015). "A revision of the Late Cretaceous–Paleocene eutherian mammal Cimolestes (Marsh, 1889)". Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences. 52 (12): 1137–1149. Bibcode:2015CaJES..52.1137F. doi:10.1139/cjes-2015-0113.
- ^ Clemens, W. A. Jr. and Russell, L. S. (1965.) "Mammalian fossils from the upper Edmonton Formation." University of Alberta Geology Bulletin, 2: 32–40.
- ^ Matthew R. Borths; Patricia A. Holroyd; Erik R. Seiffert (2016). "Hyainailourine and teratodontine cranial material from the late Eocene of Egypt and the application of parsimony and Bayesian methods to the phylogeny and biogeography of Hyaenodonta (Placentalia, Mammalia)". PeerJ. 4: e2639. doi:10.7717/peerj.2639. PMC 5111901. PMID 27867761.
- ^ Borths, Matthew R; Stevens, Nancy J (2017). "Deciduous dentition and dental eruption of Hyainailouroidea (Hyaenodonta, "Creodonta," Placentalia, Mammalia)". Palaeontologia Electronica. 20 (3): 55A. doi:10.26879/776.
- ^ Andreas Lang (2023.) "Analysis of functional morphology in carnassial dentitions (Carnivora, Dasyuromorphia, Hyaenodonta)". Dissertation, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn.
- ^ Upham, Nathan S.; Esselstyn, Jacob A.; Jetz, Walter (2021-10-11). "Molecules and fossils tell distinct yet complementary stories of mammal diversification". Current Biology. 31 (19): 4195–4206.e3. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2021.07.012. ISSN 0960-9822. PMC 9090300. PMID 34329589.
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