| Elosuchus Temporal range: | |
|---|---|
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| Skull of E. cherifiensis | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Clade: | Archosauria |
| Clade: | Pseudosuchia |
| Clade: | Crocodylomorpha |
| Clade: | Crocodyliformes |
| Family: | † Pholidosauridae |
| Genus: | † Elosuchus de Broin, 2002 |
| Species | |
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Elosuchus is an extinct genus of neosuchian crocodyliform that lived during the Middle Cretaceous of what is now Africa (Niger, Morocco and Algeria).
Elosuchus had an elongated snout like a gharial and was probably a fully aquatic animal. The type species, E. cherifiensis from Algeria and Morocco, was originally described as a species of Thoracosaurus by Lavocat, [2] but was recognized as a genus separate from Thoracosaurus by de Broin in 2002. Elosuchus felixi, described from the Echkar Formation of Niger, was renamed Fortignathus in 2016 and is either a dyrosaurid relative or a non-hyposaurine dyrosaurid. [3] [4] The largest known skull indicates a body length of up to 7.7 metres (25 ft 3 in). [1]
de Broin (2002) created the family Elosuchidae to contain Elosuchus and the genus Stolokrosuchus from Niger. [3] However, recent phylogenetic analyses usually find Stolokrosuchus to be one of the basalmost neosuchian, only distantly related to Elosuchus. [5] [6] [7] [8] Some analyses find a monophyletic Pholidosauridae that includes Elosuchus, [7] while other analyses find Elosuchus to nest with taxa like Sarcosuchus in a clade as a sister-taxon to the node Dyrosauridae+Pholidosauridae. [6] [8]
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