Bichirs and the reedfish comprise Polypteridae, a family of archaic ray-finned fishes and the only family in the order Polypteriformes.
Spinosaurus is a genus of spinosaurid dinosaur that lived in what now is North Africa during the Cenomanian to upper Turonian stages of the Late Cretaceous period, about 99 to 93.5 million years ago. The genus was known first from Egyptian remains discovered in 1912 and described by German palaeontologist Ernst Stromer in 1915. The original remains were destroyed in World War II, but additional material came to light in the early 21st century. It is unclear whether one or two species are represented in the fossils reported in the scientific literature. The best known species is S. aegyptiacus from Egypt, although a potential second species, S. maroccanus, has been recovered from Morocco. The contemporary spinosaurid genus Sigilmassasaurus has also been synonymized by some authors with S. aegyptiacus, though other researchers propose it to be a distinct taxon. Another possible junior synonym is Oxalaia from the Alcântara Formation in Brazil.
Neoceratodus is a genus of lungfish in the family Neoceratodontidae. The extant Australian lungfish is the only surviving member of this genus, but it was formerly much more widespread, being distributed throughout Africa, Australia, and South America. Species were also much more diverse in body plan; for example, the Cretaceous species Neoceratodus africanus was a gigantic species that coexisted with Spinosaurus in what is now the Kem Kem Formation of Morocco. The earliest fossils from this genus are of Neoceratodus potkooroki from the mid Cretaceous (Albian-Cenomanian) Griman Creek Formation of Australia; remains from the Late Jurassic of Uruguay assigned to this genus probably do not belong to the genus.
Carcharodontosaurus is a genus of carnivorous theropod dinosaur that lived in North Africa from about 99 to 94 million years ago during the Cenomanian stage of the Late Cretaceous. Two teeth of the genus, now lost, were first described from Algeria by French paleontologists Charles Depéret and Justin Savornin as Megalosaurus saharicus. A partial skeleton was collected by crews of German paleontologist Ernst Stromer during a 1914 expedition to Egypt. Stromer did not report the Egyptian find until 1931, in which he dubbed the novel genus Carcharodontosaurus, making the type species C. saharicus. Unfortunately, this skeleton was destroyed during the Second World War. In 1995 a nearly complete skull of C. saharicus, the first well-preserved specimen to be found in almost a century, was discovered in the Kem Kem Beds of Morocco; it was designated the neotype in 1996. Fossils unearthed from the Echkar Formation of northern Niger were described and named as another species, C. iguidensis, in 2007.
Aegyptosaurus is a genus of sauropod dinosaur that lived in what is now Africa, around 95 million years ago, during the Late Cretaceous Period.
Bahariasaurus is an enigmatic genus of large theropod dinosaur. Bahariasaurus is known to have included at least 1 species, Bahariasaurus ingens, which was found in North African rock layers dating to the Cenomanian and Turonian ages of the Late Cretaceous. The only fossils confidently assigned to Bahariasaurus were found in the Bahariya Formation of the Bahariya oasis in Egypt by Ernst Stromer but were destroyed during a World War II bombing raid with the same raid taking out the holotype of Spinosaurus and Aegyptosaurus among other animals found in the Bahariya Formation. While there have been more fossils assigned to the genus such as some from the Farak Formation of Niger, these remains are referred to with much less certainty. Bahariasaurus is, by most estimations, one of the largest theropods, approaching the height and length of other large bodied theropods such as Tyrannosaurus rex and the contemporaneous Carcharodontosaurus. The aforementioned estimations tend to put it at around 11–12.2 metres in length and 4-4.8 tonnes in overall weight.
Deltadromeus is a genus of theropod dinosaur from Northern Africa. It had long, unusually slender hind limbs for its size, suggesting that it was a swift runner. The skull is not known. One fossil specimen of a single species has been described, found in the Kem Kem Beds, which date to the mid-Cretaceous Period, about 95 million years ago. It may be a junior synonym of the contemporary Bahariasaurus. The classification of Deltadromeus has been in flux since its original description. In 2016, a South American theropod known as Gualicho shinyae was found to possess many similarities with Deltadromeus. Depending on the phylogenetic position of Gualicho, Deltadromeus may have been a neovenatorid carnosaur, a tyrannosauroid, or a basal coelurosaur if its close relation to Gualicho is legitimate. Other studies have considered it a ceratosaurian, more specifically a member of the family Noasauridae.
Protosphyraena is a fossil genus of swordfish-like marine fish, that thrived worldwide during the Upper Cretaceous Period (Coniacian-Maastrichtian). Though fossil remains of this taxon have been found in both Europe and Asia, it is perhaps best known from the Smoky Hill Member of the Niobrara Chalk Formation of Kansas. Protosphyraena was a large fish, averaging 2–3 metres in length. Protosphyraena shared the Cretaceous oceans with aquatic reptiles, such as mosasaurs and plesiosaurs, as well as with many other species of extinct predatory fish. The name Protosphyraena is a combination of the Greek word protos ("early") plus Sphyraena, the genus name for barracuda, as paleontologists initially mistook Protosphyraena for an ancestral barracuda. Recent research shows that the genus Protosphyraena is not at all related to the true swordfish-family Xiphiidae, but belongs to the extinct family Pachycormidae.
Ceratodus is an extinct genus of lungfish. It has been described as a "catch all", and a "form genus" used to refer to the remains of a variety of lungfish belonging to the extinct family Ceratodontidae. Fossil evidence dates back to the Early Triassic. A wide range of fossil species from different time periods have been found around the world in places such as the United States, Argentina, Greenland, England, Germany, Egypt, Madagascar, China, and Australia. Ceratodus is believed to have become extinct sometime around the beginning of the Eocene Epoch.
The Bahariya Formation is a fossiliferous geologic formation dating back to the early Cenomanian, which outcrops within the Bahariya depression in Egypt, and is known from oil exploration drilling across much of the Western Desert where it forms an important oil reservoir.
Gobiconodon is an extinct genus of carnivorous mammals belonging to the family Gobiconodontidae. Undisputed records of Gobiconodon are restricted to the Early Cretaceous of Asia and North America, but isolated teeth attributed to the genus have also been described from formations in England and Morocco dating as far back as the Middle Jurassic. Species of Gobiconodon varied considerably in size, with G. ostromi, one of the larger species, being around the size of a modern Virginia opossum. Like other gobiconodontids, it possessed several speciations towards carnivory, such as shearing molariform teeth, large canine-like incisors and powerful jaw and forelimb musculature, indicating that it probably fed on vertebrate prey. Unusually among predatory mammals and other eutriconodonts, the lower canines were vestigial, with the first lower incisor pair having become massive and canine-like. Like the larger Repenomamus there might be some evidence of scavenging.
Trachymetopon is an extinct genus of prehistoric coelacanth from the Jurassic of Europe. Fossils have been found in the Early Jurassic Posidonia Shale of Germany the Middle Jurassic Marnes de Dives of France, and probably the Late Jurassic Kimmeridge Clay of England. Only one species has been named, Trachymetopon liassicum, described by Henning in 1951 from an almost complete specimen found in the Lower Toarcian of Ohmden in Baden-Württemberg. Another specimen is known from the same site, and two older specimens come from the Sinemurian of Holzmaden. The holotype of this species is 1.6 metres in length. A giant specimen of an undetermined species of Trachymetopon found at the Middle Jurassic Falaises des Vaches Noires of Normandy. This specimen, composed of a 53 cm long palatoquadrate, belongs to an individual 4 metres (13 ft) in length. A basisphenoid found in a museum in Switzerland that likely originates from the same locaity probably belonged to an individual around 5 m (16 ft) long, making Trachymetopon the largest of all coelacanths alongside Mawsonia. A study published in 2015 revealed that this coelacanth belongs to the Mawsoniidae. Trachymetopon is one of the few known mawsoniids to have been exclusively marine, while most of the other members of the group have lived in fresh and brackish waters.
Stomatosuchidae is an extinct family of neosuchian crocodylomorphs. It is defined as the most inclusive clade containing Stomatosuchus inermis but not Notosuchus terrestris, Simosuchus clarki, Araripesuchus gomesii, Baurusuchus pachecoi, Peirosaurus torminni, or Crocodylus niloticus. Two genera are known to belong to Stomatosuchidae: Stomatosuchus, the type genus, and Laganosuchus. Fossils have been found from Egypt, Morocco, and Niger. Both lived during the Cenomanian stage of the Late Cretaceous. The skulls of stomatosuchids are said to be platyrostral because they have unusually flattened, elongate, duck-shaped craniums with U-shaped jaws. This platyrostral condition is similar to what is seen in the "nettosuchid" Mourasuchus, which is not closely related to stomatosuchids as it is a more derived alligatoroid that existed during the Miocene.
Cladistia is a clade of bony fishes whose only living members are the bichirs of tropical Africa. Their major synapomorphies are a heterocercal tail in which the dorsal fin has independent rays, and a posteriorly elongated parasphenoid.
Oxalaia is a genus of spinosaurid dinosaur that lived in what is now the Northeast Region of Brazil during the Cenomanian stage of the Late Cretaceous period, sometime between 100.5 and 93.9 million years ago. Its only known fossils were found in 1999 on Cajual Island in the rocks of the Alcântara Formation, which is known for its abundance of fragmentary, isolated fossil specimens. The remains of Oxalaia were described in 2011 by Brazilian palaeontologist Alexander Kellner and colleagues, who assigned the specimens to a new genus containing one species, Oxalaia quilombensis. The species name refers to the Brazilian quilombo settlements. Oxalaia quilombensis is the eighth officially named theropod species from Brazil and the largest carnivorous dinosaur discovered there. It is closely related to the African genus Spinosaurus, and/or may be a junior synonym of this taxon.
Paralititan was a giant titanosaurian sauropod dinosaur genus discovered in coastal deposits in the Upper Cretaceous Bahariya Formation of Egypt. It lived between 99.6 and 93.5 million years ago.
The Aoufous Formation is a geological formation that contains some of the vertebrate assemblage of the Kem Kem Group, of Late Cretaceous date. Two other formations comprise the Kem Kem beds: the underlying Ifezouane Formation and the overlying Akrabou Formation.
Antarctosuchus is an extinct genus of capitosauroid temnospondyl known from the Middle Triassic upper Fremouw Formation in the Transantarctic Mountains of Antarctica. It contains a single species, Antarctosuchus polyodon.
Mansourasaurus is a genus of herbivorous lithostrotian sauropod dinosaur from the Quseir Formation of Egypt. The type and only species is Mansourasaurus shahinae.
Serenoichthys is an extinct genus of small bichir from the Late Cretaceous (Cenomanian) of southeastern Morocco. The genus is monotypic, the type and only species being Serenoichthys kemkemensis. Only known at first from postcranial skeletons, complete specimens were later discovered.
