| Rubricacaecilia Temporal range: Berriasian | |
|---|---|
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| Schematic of the jaw | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Amphibia |
| Order: | Gymnophiona |
| Genus: | † Rubricacaecilia Evans and Sigogneau-Russell, 2001 |
| Species: | †R. monbaroni |
| Binomial name | |
| †Rubricacaecilia monbaroni Evans and Sigogneau-Russell, 2001 | |
Rubricacaecilia is an extinct genus of caecilian (limbless amphibian) from the Berriasian aged Ksar Metlili Formation in Morocco. [1]
Amphibians are ectothermic, anamniotic, four-limbed vertebrate animals that constitute the class Amphibia. In its broad sense, it is paraphyletic group encompassing all tetrapods excluding the amniotes. All extant (living) amphibians belong to the monophyletic subclass Lissamphibia, with three living orders: Anura (frogs), Urodela (salamanders), and Gymnophiona (caecilians). Evolved to be mostly semiaquatic, amphibians have adapted to inhabit a wide variety of habitats, with most species living in freshwater, wetland or terrestrial ecosystems. Their life cycle typically starts out as aquatic larvae with gills known as tadpoles, but some species have developed behavioural adaptations to bypass this.
The Lissamphibia is a group of tetrapods that includes all modern amphibians. Lissamphibians consist of three living groups: the Salientia, the Caudata, and the Gymnophiona.
Caecilians are a group of limbless, vermiform (worm-shaped) or serpentine (snake-shaped) amphibians with small or sometimes nonexistent eyes. They mostly live hidden in soil or in streambeds, and this cryptic lifestyle renders caecilians among the least familiar amphibians. Modern caecilians live in the tropics of South and Central America, Africa, and southern Asia. Caecilians feed on small subterranean creatures such as earthworms. The body is cylindrical and often darkly coloured, and the skull is bullet-shaped and strongly built. Caecilian heads have several unique adaptations, including fused cranial and jaw bones, a two-part system of jaw muscles, and a chemosensory tentacle in front of the eye. The skin is slimy and bears ringlike markings or grooves and may contain scales.
The Batrachia are a clade of amphibians that includes frogs and salamanders, but not caecilians nor the extinct allocaudates. The name Batrachia was first used by French zoologist Pierre André Latreille in 1800 to refer to frogs, but has more recently been defined in a phylogenetic sense as a node-based taxon that includes the last common ancestor of frogs and salamanders and all of its descendants. The idea that frogs and salamanders are more closely related to each other than either is to caecilians is strongly supported by morphological and molecular evidence; they are, for instance, the only vertebrates able to raise and lower their eyes. However, an alternative hypothesis exists in which salamanders and caecilians are each other's closest relatives as part of a clade called the Procera, with frogs positioned as the sister taxon of this group.
Ex opere operato is a Latin phrase meaning "from the work performed" that, in reference to sacraments, signifies that they derive their efficacy not from the minister or from the recipient, but from the sacrament considered independently of the merits of the minister or the recipient. According to the ex opere operato interpretation of the sacraments, any positive effect comes not from any human worthiness or faith, but from the sacrament as an instrument of God.
Typhlonectidae, also known as aquatic caecilians or rubber eels, are a family of caecilians found east of the Andes in South America.
The Tamiami Canal or C-4 Canal, is a canal located in southern Florida in the United States. It flows in a west to east direction from the western part of the state in the Everglades past the Miami International Airport to a salinity control center near the Miami River. It averages 8 feet in depth and is over 100 feet wide in some areas.
Ichthyophis sikkimensis, the Sikkimese caecilian or Darjeeling caecilian, is a species of caecilian found in India, Nepal and possibly Bhutan. It was described by Edward Harrison Taylor in 1960.
Gegeneophis danieli, the Amboli caecilian or Daniel's caecilian, is a species of caecilians in the family Indotyphlidae. It was discovered from near Amboli in Western Ghats of Maharashtra.
Boulengerula is a genus of amphibians in the family Herpelidae. They are found in East Africa. They are sometimes known as Boulenger's caecilians or Usambara bluish-gray caecilians.
Siphonops is a genus of caecilians in the family Siphonopidae. It contains the following species:
Ichthyophis hypocyaneus, the Javan caecilian or marsh caecilian, is a species of amphibian in the family Ichthyophiidae of caecilians, endemic to Java, Indonesia. Until its rediscovery in 2000, it was known only from the 1827 type specimen.
Gerobatrachus is an extinct genus of amphibamid temnospondyl that lived in the Early Permian, approximately 290 million years ago (Ma), in the area that is now Baylor County, Texas. When it was first described in 2008, Gerobatrachus was announced to be the closest relative of Batrachia, the group that includes modern frogs and salamanders. It possesses a mixture of characteristics from both groups, including a large frog-like head and a salamander-like tail. These features have led to it being dubbed a frogamander by the press. Some more recent studies place Gerobatrachus as the closest relative of Lissamphibia, the group that contains all modern amphibians including frogs, salamanders, and caecilians, or place modern amphibians far from Gerobatrachus within a group called Lepospondyli.
Lapillopsidae is a family of Temnospondyli.
Stereospondylomorpha is a clade of temnospondyls. It includes the superfamily Archegosauroidea and the more diverse group Stereospondyli. Stereospondylomorpha was first proposed by Yates and Warren (2000), who found Archegosauroidea and Stereospondyli to be sister taxa in their phylogenetic analysis. A similar clade is Archegosauriformes, named by Schoch and Milner (2000), which includes Stereospondyli and some Permian temnospondyls that are similar in appearance to stereospondyls, including the archegosauroids. However, according to Schoch and Milner's phylogeny, Archegosauroidea is a paraphyletic group of taxa that are successively basal to Stereospondyli, rather than a monophyletic sister taxon.
Limnarchia is a clade of temnospondyls. It includes the mostly Carboniferous-Permian age Dvinosauria and the mostly Permian-Triassic age Stereospondylomorpha. The clade was named in a 2000 phylogenetic analysis of stereospondyls and their relatives. Limnarchia means "lake rulers" in Greek, in reference to their aquatic lifestyles and long existence over a span of approximately 200 million years from the Late Carboniferous to the Early Cretaceous. In phylogenetic terms, Limnarchia is a stem-based taxon including all temnospondyls more closely related to Parotosuchus than to Eryops. It is the sister group of the clade Euskelia, which is all temnospondyls more closely related to Eryops than to Parotosuchus. Limnarchians represent an evolutionary radiation of temnospondyls into aquatic environments, while euskelians represent a radiation into terrestrial environments. While many euskelians were adapted to life on land with strong limbs and bony scutes, most limnarchians were better adapted for the water with poorly developed limbs and lateral line sensory systems in their skulls.
Rhynchonkos is an extinct genus of rhynchonkid microsaur. Originally known as Goniorhynchus, it was renamed in 1981 because the name had already been given to another genus; the family, likewise, was originally named Goniorhynchidae but renamed in 1988. The type and only known species is R. stovalli, found from the Early Permian Fairmont Shale in Cleveland County, Oklahoma. Rhynchonkos shares many similarities with Eocaecilia, an early caecilian from the Early Jurassic of Arizona. Similarities between Rhynchonkos and Eocaecilia have been taken as evidence that caecilians are descendants of microsaurs. However, such a relationship is no longer widely accepted.
Rileymillerus is an extinct genus of temnospondyl amphibian from the Late Triassic Post Quarry in the Dockum Group of Texas that was described by John Bolt and Sankar Chatterjee in 2000. The holotype, a nearly complete skull with articulated jaws, is housed at the Museum of Texas Tech University. The genus is named for Riley Miller, who allowed Chatterjee to work on the Post Quarry, and the species is named for the paleontologist John Cosgriff.
Gegeneophis is a genus of amphibians in the family Grandisoniidae. They are found in southern and northeastern India.
Chinlestegophis is a diminutive Late Triassic stereospondyl that has been interpreted as a putative stem caecilian, a living group of legless burrowing amphibians. If Chinlestegophis is indeed both an advanced stereospondyl and a relative of caecilians, this means that stereospondyls survived to the present day; historically the group was thought to have gone extinct by the early Cretaceous. Chinlestegophis jenkinsi, the type and only species, is known from two partial skulls discovered in the Chinle Formation in Colorado.
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