Search publications of the members of the Royal Belgian institute of natural Sciences
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Late Cretaceous amphibians and lacertilians from Pui (Hateg Basin, Romania)
- In 2000 and 2001, a joint team from Universitatea Babeş-Bolyai (Cluj-Napoca, Romania) and the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (Brussels, Belgium) screen-washed 2500 kg of sediments from a new large lens found in the south of the Pui village along the Bărbat river. The sediments are attributed to the Maastrichtian Sânpetru Formation that yielded one of the richest and most diversified Late Cretaceous continental faunas in Europe. The red colored silty layer found at Pui, probably deposited in a northerly flowing braided river system under a warm and humid climate with seasonal fluctuations. Numerous fragments of lacertilian and amphibian microfossils were found in this site. The amphibians are represented by a Discoglossidae ind. and a Lissamphibia (Albanerpeton cf. inexpectatum). It suggests that the genus Albanerpeton came into Europe during the Late Cretaceous, instead of the Tertiary as previously thought. The lacertilians are represented by a Squamata ind., a new Teiidae (Paraglyphanodon nov. sp.) and two Paramacellodidae (Becklesius nov. sp. and aff. hoffstetteri). The stratigraphical range of the latter family is thus extended for a 70 Ma period, as this genus was previously described from Kimmeridgian deposits. The presence of Albanerpeton and Paraglyphanodon at Pui indicates a North American influence on the East European amphibian and lacertilian faunas by Maastrichtian times.
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Parataxonomic classification of eggshells from Pui in the Hateg Basin (Romania)
- Examination of forty egg fragments collected from the site of Pui (Hateg Basin) has revealed a greater ootaxonomic diversity that known from complete eggs or clutches found in the other Upper Cretaceous localities from Romania (Grigorescu 1993, Grigorescu et al. 1994; Codrea et al in press). The eggshells obtained by screen-washing, were associated with a diversified microvertebrate remains (including dinosaurs, squamates, mammals…). The egg material correspond to several parataxonomic units (Mikhaïlov et al. 1996) and is referred to 5 morphotypes (discretispherulitic, prolatospherulitic, prismatic, ratite and geckonoid). The study of these ootypes provids us paleogeographical data and clues about the diversity of egg layers in the Campano-Maastrichtian from Romania
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A remarkable new hollow-crested hadrosaurid dinosaur from Far Eastern Russia
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Dinosaur egg nests, mammals and other vertebrates from a new Maatsrichtian site of the Hateg Basin (Romania)
- The Toteşti-baraj site is located in the central part of the Haţeg Basin, in the northwestern part of the South Carpathians. According to the geological map of the area, the outcropping sediments belong to the Maastrichtian Sânpetru Formation. However, the general appearance in the field of the studied sediments is rather different from the sediments of the type locality of the Sânpetru Formation. The facies distribution observed at Toteşti-baraj indicates a fluvial palaeoenvironment with sandy channel infills and mainly black silty and clayey overbank deposits. At the end of spring 2001, the first Belgo-Romanian excavation campaign discovered in this locality more than forty eggs organised in 11 nests. These eggs may be referred to as the oofamily Megaloolithidae and closely resemble the eggs previously described in the Haţeg Basin and the French oospecies Megaloolithus siruguei. The locality was probably frequented as a nesting site during a large time span, as dinosaur nests have been found at different stratigraphic levels. Screen-washing of 1500 kilograms of sediments collected around the nests provided a particularly diversified microvertebrate fauna. Amphibians are represented by Albanerpetontidae and discoglossid Anura. Two types of sciencomorph lepidosaurians co-existed in this locality. Dinosaur teeth are particularly diversified in the sample collected at Totesti-Barraj. Besides hadrosauroid and nodosaurid ornithischians, at least five different kinds of isolated theropod teeth may be distinguished. But the most remarkable collected micro-remains are mammal teeth, representing at present the richest multituberculate collection from the Upper Cretaceous of Europe. The presence of at least two taxa of the family Kogaionidae (Multituberculata) is attested by fourteen complete teeth and several tooth fragments of mammals. Micropalaeontological analysis and study of vertebrates are in process in order to determine more precisely the age, the faunal content and the palaeoenvironment of the Totesti-Baraj locality.
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A new late Maastrichtian lambeosaurine dinosaur from northeastern China
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A new elasmosaurid plesiosaur from the Lower Jurassic of Occitania
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New lithostratigraphical, sedimentological, palaeontological and clay data on the Mesozoic of Belgian Lorraine
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Toarcian marine reptiles from Luxembourg. In : Les schistes bitumineux
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Late Maastrichtian hadrosaurs from the Amur Region (Russia and China): preliminary investigations
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Latest Cretaceous elasmosaur remains from the Maastrichtian type area, Belgium and Morocco and their Palaeobiogeographical implications
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Dwarf traversodontids (Synapsida, Cynodontia) from the Late Triassic of Lorraine and Luxembourg
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Late Triassic vertebrates from Syren
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Walou Cave (Vesdre Basin, Begium). New palynological data for the Upper Pleistocene in Belgium
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Contribution de la paléobotanique a l'étude pluridisciplinaire des séquences sédimentaires dans les entrées de grottes et les abris-sous-roche en Belgique : le site de Walou
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New insight on the chronology of the Upper Palaeolithic in central and east Europe
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Climatic signature and chronology of the Late Pleistocene loess-palaeosol successions from Central and Eastern Europe
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Radiocarbon chronology and climatic signature of the middle pleniglacial loess from Danube to Yenisei: comparison with the marine and Greenland data
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Ancestors of domestic cats in Neolithic Central Europe: Isotopic evidence of a synanthropic diet
- Most of today’s domesticates began as farm animals, but cat domestication took a different path. Cats became commensal of humans somewhere in the Fertile Crescent, attracted to early farmers’ settlements by rodent pests. Cat remains from Poland dated to 4,200 to 2,300 y BCE are currently the earliest evidence for the migration of the Near Eastern wildcat to Central Europe. Tracking the possible synanthropic origin of that migration, we used stable isotopes to investigate the paleodiet. We found that the ecological balance was already changed due to the expansion of Neolithic farmlands. We conclude that among the Late Neolithic Near Eastern wildcats from Poland were free-living individuals, who preyed on rodent pests and shared ecological niches with native European wildcats.Cat remains from Poland dated to 4,200 to 2,300 y BCE are currently the earliest evidence for the migration of the Near Eastern cat (NE cat), the ancestor of domestic cats, into Central Europe. This early immigration preceded the known establishment of housecat populations in the region by around 3,000 y. One hypothesis assumed that NE cats followed the migration of early farmers as synanthropes. In this study, we analyze the stable isotopes in six samples of Late Neolithic NE cat bones and further 34 of the associated fauna, including the European wildcat. We approximate the diet and trophic ecology of Late Neolithic felids in a broad context of contemporary wild and domestic animals and humans. In addition, we compared the ecology of Late Neolithic NE cats with the earliest domestic cats known from the territory of Poland, dating to the Roman Period. Our results reveal that human agricultural activity during the Late Neolithic had already impacted the isotopic signature of rodents in the ecosystem. These synanthropic pests constituted a significant proportion of the NE cat’s diet. Our interpretation is that Late Neolithic NE cats were opportunistic synanthropes, most probably free-living individuals (i.e., not directly relying on a human food supply). We explore niche partitioning between studied NE cats and the contemporary native European wildcats. We find only minor differences between the isotopic ecology of both these taxa. We conclude that, after the appearance of the NE cat, both felid taxa shared the ecological niches.
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Spiders in Galapagos – diversity, biogeography and origin
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First records of Eulophidae from Cambodia (Hymenoptera: Chalcidoidea)
