Devonian tetrapod from western Europe

Clément, Gérard; Ahlberg, Per; Blieck, Alain; Blom, Henning; Clack, Jennifer A.; Poty, Edouard; Thorez, Jacques; Janvier, Philippe

doi:10.1038/427412a

Cited by 49 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…This again suggests a brackish rather than a freshwater origin for the group as was assumed in the past and helps explain how, only a few million years later, Devonian tetrapods are found throughout the world. Jaw and other fragments have now been found in Australia (Campbell andBell 1977, confirmed by Ahlberg andClack 1998), China (Zhu et al 2002), Belgium (Clement et al 2004), and further sites in Russia (Lebedev 2004). …”

Section: What Can We Learn From This Information?mentioning

confidence: 81%

The Fish–Tetrapod Transition: New Fossils and Interpretations

Clack¹

2009

Evo Edu Outreach

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Our information on the transition between fish with fins and tetrapods with limbs and digits has increased manyfold in the last 15-20 years and especially in the last 5 or 10 years, with some spectacular finds of new material. Some of these include new tetrapod-like fish and very primitive tetrapods that help to resolve questions of the sequence of acquisition of tetrapod characters, the approximate timing of the events, the likely geographic location, and the circumstances under which it happened. Forelimbs and skulls became modified in advance of hind limbs, adapted for supporting the head and front of the body out of the water, probably in connection with air breathing. The likely time of origin for limbed tetrapods is between 385 and 380 million years ago, probably in the northern continent of Laurussia. The origin of limbed tetrapods did not coincide with the acquisition of full terrestriality, an outcome that probably arose in the Early Carboniferous. This later part of the story is documented by few fossils, though two in particular give key information. Studies of modern vertebrates, especially the evolutionary developmental genetics of Hox genes, are beginning to provide clues to the origin of digits.

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Section: What Can We Learn From This Information?mentioning

confidence: 81%

The Fish–Tetrapod Transition: New Fossils and Interpretations

Clack¹

2009

Evo Edu Outreach

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“…The Strud quarry (Namur Province, Belgium) is one of the few localities in the world that has yielded Devonian tetrapod remains [1]. The tetrapod remains were found in association with very abundant flora [2], a putative insect [3–5], continental crustaceans [6–9] as well as sarcopterygian [10–12] and as yet undescribed acanthodian and actinopterygian fishes.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Placoderm Assemblage from the Tetrapod-Bearing Locality of Strud (Belgium, Upper Famennian) Provides Evidence for a Fish Nursery

Olive¹,

Clément²,

Daeschler³

et al. 2016

PLoS ONE

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The placoderm fauna of the upper Famennian tetrapod-bearing locality of Strud, Belgium, includes the antiarch Grossilepis rikiki, the arthrodire groenlandaspidid Turrisaspis strudensis and the phyllolepidid Phyllolepis undulata. Based on morphological and morphometric evidence, the placoderm specimens from Strud are predominantly recognised as immature specimens and this locality as representing a placoderm nursery. The Strud depositional environment corresponds to a channel in an alluvial plain, and the presence of a nursery in such environment could have provided nutrients and protection to the placoderm offspring. This represents one of the earliest pieces of evidence for this sort of habitat partitioning in vertebrate history, with adults living more distantly from the nursery and using the nursery only to spawn or give live birth.

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“…The first body fossils identified as stegocephalians (limbed vertebrates) are known from strata Ϸ370 MYBP, such that the appearance of the limb with digits, the loss of the opercular apparatus, and the development of other characters that subsequently allowed a terrestrial lifestyle, presumably occurred during the 25-My interval between 385 and 360 MYBP (3,4). Most of our understanding about these crucial vertebrate events comes from only a few freshwater deposits from Euramerican localities, with outcrops in Greenland producing the most prolific stegocephalian remains.…”

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confidence: 99%

Confirmation of Romer's Gap as a low oxygen interval constraining the timing of initial arthropod and vertebrate terrestrialization

Ward

Labandeira

Laurin

et al. 2006

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

132

104

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The first terrestrialization of species that evolved from previously aquatic taxa was a seminal event in evolutionary history. For vertebrates, one of the most important terrestrialized groups, this event was interrupted by a time interval known as Romer's Gap, for which, until recently, few fossils were known. Here, we argue that geochronologic range data of terrestrial arthropods show a pattern similar to that of vertebrates. Thus, Romer's Gap is real, occupied an interval from 360 million years before present (MYBP) to 345 MYBP, and occurred when environmental conditions were unfavorable for air-breathing, terrestrial animals. These model results suggest that atmospheric oxygen levels were the major driver of successful terrestrialization, and a low-oxygen interval accounts for Romer's Gap. Results also show that terrestrialization among members of arthropod and vertebrate clades occurred in two distinct phases. The first phase was a 65-million-year ( (1) indicates that arthropods, with species interpreted as fully land-based before 400 million years before present (MYBP) (2), preceded vertebrates onto land by tens of millions of years. The first body fossils identified as stegocephalians (limbed vertebrates) are known from strata Ϸ370 MYBP, such that the appearance of the limb with digits, the loss of the opercular apparatus, and the development of other characters that subsequently allowed a terrestrial lifestyle, presumably occurred during the 25-My interval between 385 and 360 MYBP (3, 4). Most of our understanding about these crucial vertebrate events comes from only a few freshwater deposits from Euramerican localities, with outcrops in Greenland producing the most prolific stegocephalian remains. Elginerpeton and Obruchevichthys were first, between 385 and 375 MYBP, followed several million years later by a modest radiation that included Ventastega, Ichythostega, Acanthostega, Tulerpeton, Metaxygnathus, and Hynerpeton. Although most of these taxa possessed limbs (although this is not certain for Elginerpeton and Obruchevichthys), all of these taxa have been interpreted as fully aquatic, rather than terrestrial (5-7). Their respiratory systems are poorly known, but osteology suggests that they were able to derive some amount of O 2 from water instead of being entirely air breathing (8). These stegocephalians disappeared soon thereafter, followed rapidly by rare appearances of limbed vertebrates. This temporal gap has long been called Romer's Gap, and until recently it was unknown whether this hiatus was due to a combination of unfavorable taphonomic conditions and collection failure or whether it represented an interval of intrinsically low diversity and an abundance of limbed vertebrates. Romer's Gap separates occurrences of the earliest (Late Devonian) aquatic stegocephalians from a much larger adaptive radiation that included the first terrestrial vertebrates that commenced during the Visean stage of the Early Carboniferous. Although new collections have partly filled Romer's Gap (9), including the d...

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Devonian tetrapod from western Europe

Cited by 49 publications

References 6 publications

The Fish–Tetrapod Transition: New Fossils and Interpretations

The Fish–Tetrapod Transition: New Fossils and Interpretations

Placoderm Assemblage from the Tetrapod-Bearing Locality of Strud (Belgium, Upper Famennian) Provides Evidence for a Fish Nursery

Confirmation of Romer's Gap as a low oxygen interval constraining the timing of initial arthropod and vertebrate terrestrialization

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