New species marks only the third toothed pterosaur identified from North America's Cretaceous -- each one discovered in North Texas
Date:December 8, 2015
Source:Southern Methodist University
A new species of toothy pterosaur is a native of Texas whose closest relative is from England.
The new 94-million-year-old species, named Cimoliopterus dunni, is strikingly similar to England's Cimoliopterus cuvieri.
Identification of the new flying reptile links prehistoric Texas to England, says paleontologist Timothy S. Myers, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, who identified the fossil as a new species.
Pterosaur relatives from two continents suggests the prehistoric creatures moved between North America and England earlier in the Cretaceous -- despite progressive widening of the North Atlantic Ocean during that time.
The Texas and English Cimoliopterus cousins are different species, so some evolutionary divergence occurred, indicating the populations were isolated from one another at 94 million years ago, Myers said.
The similarity between the two species, however, implies minimal divergence time, so gene flow between North American and European populations would have been possible at some point shortly before that date.
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