The Cenozoic is Earth's current geological era, representing the last 66 million years of Earth's history. It is characterized by the dominance of mammals, birds, conifers, and angiosperms. It is the latest of three geological eras, preceded by the Mesozoic and Paleozoic. The Cenozoic started with the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event, when many species, including the non-avian dinosaurs, became extinct in an event attributed by most experts to the impact of a large asteroid or other celestial body, the Chicxulub impactor.
Perissodactyla is an order of ungulates. The order includes about 17 living species divided into three families: Equidae, Rhinocerotidae (rhinoceroses), and Tapiridae (tapirs). They typically have reduced the weight-bearing toes to three or one of the five original toes, though tapirs retain four toes on their front feet. The nonweight-bearing toes are either present, absent, vestigial, or positioned posteriorly. By contrast, artiodactyls bear most of their weight equally on four or two of the five toes: their third and fourth toes. Another difference between the two is that perissodactyls digest plant cellulose in their intestines, rather than in one or more stomach chambers as artiodactyls, with the exception of Suina, do.
A rhinoceros, commonly abbreviated to rhino, is a member of any of the five extant species of odd-toed ungulates in the family Rhinocerotidae; it can also refer to a member of any of the extinct species of the superfamily Rhinocerotoidea. Two of the extant species are native to Africa, and three to South and Southeast Asia.
Paraceratherium is an extinct genus of hornless rhinocerotoids belonging to the family Paraceratheriidae. It is one of the largest terrestrial mammals that has ever existed and lived from the early to late Oligocene epoch. The first fossils were discovered in what is now Pakistan, and remains have been found across Eurasia between China and the Balkans. Paraceratherium means "near the hornless beast", in reference to Aceratherium, the genus in which the type species P. bugtiense was originally placed.
Juxia, ‘joo-she-a’, is an extinct genus of paraceratheriid, a group of herbivorous mammals that are related to the modern rhinoceros. The type species is Juxia sharamurenensis, named by Zhou Mingzhen and Qiu Zhanxiang in 1964. Juxia was around the size of a horse. It lived in Asia during the upper Eocene.
Asiavorator is an extinct genus of civet-like carnivoran belonging in the family Stenoplesictidae. It was endemic to Asia and lived during the Eocene and Oligocene epochs.
The Irdin Manha Formation is a geological formation from the Eocene located in Inner Mongolia, China, a few kilometres south of the Mongolian border.
Brontotheriidae is a family of extinct mammals belonging to the order Perissodactyla, the order that includes horses, rhinoceroses, and tapirs. Superficially, they looked rather like rhinos with some developing bony nose horns, and were some of the earliest mammals to have evolved large body sizes. They lived around 56–34 million years ago, until the very close of the Eocene. Brontotheres had a Holarctic distribution, with the exception of Western Europe: they occupied North America, Asia, and Eastern Europe. They were the first fossilized mammals to be discovered west of the Mississippi, and were first discovered in South Dakota.
Rhinocerotoidea is a superfamily of perissodactyls that appeared 56 million years ago in the Paleocene. They included four extinct families, the Amynodontidae, the Hyracodontidae, the Paraceratheriidae, and the Eggysodontidae. The only extant family is the Rhinocerotidae, which survives as five living species. Extinct non-rhinocerotid members of the group are sometimes considered rhinoceroses in a broad sense. Although the term 'rhinoceroses' is sometimes used to refer to all of these, a less ambiguous vernacular term for this group is 'rhinocerotoids'. The family Paraceratheriidae contains the largest land mammals known to have ever existed.
Deng Tao is a Chinese palaeontologist at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP), Chinese Academy of Sciences, who has made important fossil discoveries on Cenozoic mammals. He is a professor of vertebrate palaeontology, deputy director of the Academic Committee, and deputy director of Key Laboratory of Evolutionary Systematics of Vertebrates at IVPP.
Eggysodon is an extinct genus of odd-toed ungulate belong to the rhinoceros-like family Eggysodontidae. It was a small, ground-dwelling browser, and fossils have been found in Oligocene deposits throughout Europe. Eggysodon may have been related to Preaceratherium, and both had tusklike canines and smaller, and fewer, incisors.
Eggysodontidae is a family of perissodactyls, closely related to rhinoceroses. Fossils have been found in Oligocene deposits in Europe, the Caucasus, Central Asia, China, and Mongolia.
Urtinotherium is an extinct genus of paracerathere mammals. It was a large animal that was closely related to Paraceratherium, and found in rocks dating from the Late Eocene to Early Oligocene period. The remains were first discovered in the Urtyn Obo region in Inner Mongolia, which the name Urtinotherium is based upon. Other referred specimens are from northern China.
Forstercooperia is an extinct genus of forstercooperiine paraceratheriid rhinocerotoids from the Middle Eocene of Asia.
Pappaceras is an extinct genus of rhinocerotoids from the Early Eocene of Asia belonging to Paraceratheriidae.
Allacerops is an extinct genus of odd-toed ungulate belong to the rhinoceros-like family Eggysodontidae. It was a small, ground-dwelling browser, and fossils have been found in Oligocene deposits throughout Central and East Asia.
Dzungariotherium is a genus of paraceratheriid, an extinct group of large, hornless rhinocerotoids, which lived during the middle and late Oligocene of northwest China. The type species D. orgosense was described in 1973 based on fossils—mainly teeth—from Dzungaria in Xinjiang, northwest China.
Aralotherium is an extinct genus of hornless rhinocerotoids closely related to Paraceratherium, one of the largest terrestrial mammals that has ever existed. It lived in China and Kazakhstan during the late Oligocene epoch. It is classified as a member of the Paraceratheriidae subfamily Paraceratheriinae.
Uintaceras is an extinct genus of medium-sized early rhinocerotoids that lived in North America during the Middle Eocene, with only the type species U. radinskyi, named in 1997, currently contained within the genus. Traditionally considered the oldest and most primitive species of the Rhinocerotidae, it may instead have been a close relative of the Asian Paraceratheriidae. The dubious species Forstercooperia (Hyrachyus) grandis is also possibly the same animal as Uintaceras, although the Asian material of F. grandis was assignable to Forstercooperia confluens.
Amphicticeps is an extinct genus of small, weasel-like carnivoran mammal. It lived in Mongolia during the Oligocene. The genus was erected in 1924 for the species A. shackelfordi on the basis of a well-preserved skull. Historically, the systematic position of this genus has been problematic until more specimens were described decades later.
